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BLINDPITS. 

7 


A STORY OF SCOTTISH LIFE. 


REPRINTED, BY SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT WITH THE EDINBURGH 

PUBLISHERS. 


. L ■ W X^ y V* * 

l> .X 



NEW YORK : 

G. P. PUTNAM & SON, PUBLISHERS, 

661 BROADWAY, 

1809. 


















\ 




























BLINDPITS. 


CHAPTER I. 

We speak of people who “have seen better days,” and to 
ears lying in wait the phrase has a certain respect and sym- 
pathy in it. To have been born and bred among the affluent 
or comfortable classes, and in time, after much tribulation, to 
settle down into indigence from which there'seems no refuge 
but the grave, is a lot somewhat the saddest. This lot had 
overtaken Mrs. David Barclay, and she had not met it with 
the soul of a heroine ; on the contrary, she had succumbed. 

In these her days of indigence she had to climb two pairs 
oS. stairs to get to her abode, and as two families entered their 
houses ffbm each landing, it will be seen that misfortune had 
not at least sent her to a desert place. A desert place — no ; 
it was a large, wealthy, flourishing city, with a rush and roar 
of life in all its streets. In this lofty habitation Mrs. David 
Barclay lived, and moaned, and bestowed her confidence on 
her neighbors as she had opportunity, wdio were no unwilling 
listeners to the details of* her former grandeur. Mrs. Barclay 
had wealthy relatives with whom she had absolutely no inter- 
course, but whom you may be sure she did not forget. She 
told Mrs. Dods — her nearest and most intimate neighbor — of 
her relation Mr. Grant, a gentleman who had the entire man- 
agement of the great Heatlierdale estates, who kept his 
carriage and visited with all the county families ; and of her 


10 


BLINDPITS. 


cousin Miss Boston, whose fortune she expected to inherit — 
“ somewhere about £20,000 ; it might be not an extraordinary 
sum, but very respectable.” Uncommonly respectable, Mrs. 
Dods thought, at the same time that she took the liberty of 
giving Mrs. Barclay credit for drawing the long bow. 

Though thus continually held in honorable remembrance in 
Mrs. Barclay’s circle, you will not be surprised to be told that 
these distinguished personages never by any chance mentioned 
Mrs. Barclay in their circles ; no doubt she lurked in their 
memories — there is proof that she did — but she was not ever 
on their tongues. As there are reasons for most things, 
reasons were not wanting for this. Bor a long time they had 
heard only evil, and that continually, of Mrs. Barclay and her 
family. First, Mr. Barclay died miserably insolvent, after 
having tried the wretched shift of living extravagantly to prop 
his falling fortunes ; then his sons — three of them — as Ahey 
grew to manhood, bored their well-to-do relatives for assistance 
of all kinds, till the grave closed over them, not leaving a very 
creditable swell on the sea of life behind them ; then, till her 
daughter discovered the one-sided correspondence and put a 
stop to it, Mrs. Barclay herself despatched many begging- 
letters — for they could be called nothing else, whatever she 
might think. A course of this kind wears out poor — that is 
rich — human nature. Mr. Grant’s wife who had been Mrs. 
Barclay’s cousin, was dead, and very likely he had poor rela- 
tions of his own ; — if he had not, he was lucky beyond most 
of the sons of Adam ; and for Miss Boston, she was not to be 
i judged by ordinary rules, — so when Mrs. Barclay ceased to 
jog the memories of her relatives, they slept so far as she was 
concerned. 

Mrs. Barclay had not been a wise good mother ; in her youth 
she had been silly, and selfish, and vain ; and in her age she 
was silly, selfish, and querulous. Hers was not an old age 
pleasant to look upon, and it must have been painfully 
unpleasant to live beside. 

It is part of the compensation for their lot, I daresay, that 
weak needy people often buoy themselves up by the expectation 


BLINDPITS. 


11 


of some all but impossible windfall ; thus, Mrs. Barclay con- 
stantly reckoned upon one day enjoying Miss Boston’s money, 
— not that she wished her death, she only counted on it. Nor 
did it serve any end for her daughter Barbara to remind her 
that Miss Boston could leave her money to whom she liked, 
and that it was in the last degree improbable that she would 
leave it to them. “Improbable!” said Mrs. Barclay ; “who 
else could she leave it to ? but you’ll be right, Barbara, and 
I’ll be 'wrong, or it will be a wonder.” It was a part of Mrs. 
Barclay’s miserable case that her daughter did not pay suffi- 
cient deference to her opinions, and she was ingenious in 
twisting things to make it appear so. Miss Boston’s money ! 
— rather than hear of Miss Boston’s death Barbara would 
have wanted her money forever. She had not seen her for 
many years, and without a special invitation — which she did 
not expect — she would not go to see her ; hut she felt that this 
world would be a darker, colder place to her if she knew Miss 
Boston was out of it. In her early halcyon days Barbara had 
often been the guest of Miss Boston for weeks together. Then 
came estrangement and her battle with the world. She was 
young then, and very likely had in her^possessioffia copy-book, 
in which was written in round text the statement that “ Ad- 
versity is the touchstone of friendship,” and she imagined she 
proved the truth of the aphorism in her mother’s quarrel with 
the Grants and Miss Boston ; she was not fully aware of the 
grounds of it, but believed it to have been occasioned by re- 
flection on her father, and she espoused it warmly, all the 
more warmly, perhaps, that she loved Miss Boston and felt her 
desertion keenly. In after years, when she was better able to 
judge of matters, she exonerated Miss Boston, and would 
have gladly sought her friendship, had Miss Boston ever rec- 
ognised her existence ; but she never did that, and Barbara 
would not thrust herself upon her in the character of a poor 
relation : she had a share of pride — proper pride she called it. 
If there be such a thing, it is a most expensive luxury ; a poor 
relation might as well drive a carriage and pair as keep it up ; 
but it is a luxury. 


12 


BLINDPITS. 


Barbara was better fitted for ber changed circumstances than 
most young ladies of her age would have been. She was pas- 
sably educated ; she was neither romantic, nor imaginative, 
nor intellectual ; she had read very few novels, and those she 
had read had been read as a duty, and she had been glad when 
they were done ; of poets she preferred Crabbe ; she liked 
facts and definite information ; her penmanship was good, as 
all her handiwork was ; and she had a tender womanly heart, 
and a special love for children and animals ; and finally, and 
most to the point, she believed in herself — in her own ability 
to dare and do. 

In person she was under middle size, inclining to be dumpy. 
She had a rather low forehead, a straight nose with finely-cut 
nostrils, a pretty mouth not expressive, dark eyes, dark hair, 
and dark complexion ; but you were not so much impressed 
with the idea that she was good-looking as that she was judi- 
cious-looking. Her dress, her manner, her aspect, might all 
be described as judicious. When she came to face that tough 
problem, What shall middle-class penniless ladies do ? she had 
no difficulty in fixing her vocation ; there was even less choice 
then than now. Not being an original genius, it never 
occurred to her that she could be a medical woman ; her mind 
was essentially commonplace, and she adopted teaching as her 
calling. I don’t think she would ever lead her pupils to the 
higher slopes of Parnassus, but she was thoroughly capable of 
teaching them the use of the hammer, the chisel, the alpen- 
stock, which would enable them to climb that height if it were 
in them to do it — and how many teachers do more ? 


CHAPTER II. 


Miss Boston was a single lady, and ugly, or, to put it 
more euphemistically — plain-looking. She had a very long 
razor-like face, with a long snuh-nose lying down the middle 
of it ; her hair was sandy in color, her eyes light grey, her 
chin sharp and projecting, her mouth small and round — it 
might have been pretty in another situation, but inserted like 
an eyelet-hole below the big rugged nose it looked simply ri- 
diculous. Add to this a sallow complexion, in which the rav- 
ages of small-pox were distinctly visible, and you will compre- 
hend that Miss Boston could not be described as eye-sweet. 
She was tall, slight, and elegantly made in person, so that 
strangers walking behind her turned round in passing to look 
in her face ; it was enough — no one looked twice, and Miss 
Boston knew it. The Bostons were a high-tempered race — 
impulsive and passionate. Although the only child of parents 
wealthy according to their station, Miss Boston in the days 
of her youth had much to endure. Her mother was a feeble 
little woman, who neither dared peep nor mutter ; her father 
was a gentleman subject to chronic irritation of temper, varied 
by occasional thunder-storms of rage, during which he would 
think nothing of making a hook, or a stool, or any other 
handy missile, fly at the head of his wife or daughter : he 
generally confined these very strong measures of authority to 
them, as he found when he included his servants in such disci- 
pline they were apt to take him into court and make a bother. 
But he had his moments of relenting, when it did occur to 
him that, after all, his only child might not he so much to 


14 


BLINDPITS. 


blame in the matter of her sex, and that if she had had her 
choice she would probably have chosen a beautiful face rather 
than an ugly one ; on both of these points he did not hesitate 
to twit her when he found it a relief to his feelings to do so. 

Miss Boston had good common sense, a manageable slice of 
her father’s temper, a warm and even romantic heart. It will 
not be surprising then, that, situated as she was at home, it 
occurred to her that there was a possibility of leaving it for 
another where she would have more genial companionship. 
Mr. Boston having a well-founded reputation for wealth, in the 
nature of things his daughter and only child did not lack 
admirers : — men who could overlook ugliness and the chance 
of a tropical hurricane shaking their rooftree, in consideration 
of the solid advantages the alliance would give. Miss Boston, 
of course, had the right of veto, and exercised it with some 
energy oftener than once ; but she also took to herself the 
right of choice, and on whom should her choice fall but on a 
quiet, decent, timid sort of man, who occupied no higher posi- 
tion than steward — grieve, as he was called — on a farm in the 
neighborhood. Him Miss Boston selected as the man she 
delighted to honor. To ordinary eyes he had no earthly 
quality raising him a quarter of an inch above thousands of 
decent men to be met with any day through the length and 
breadth of the land ; to Miss Boston’s eyes, I verily 
believe he wore a glory round his head. It seems laugh- 
able. John Simson — the hero — had, I grieve to say, been 
in the habit of characterising Miss Boston to his fellow- 
servants as “ an ill-faured randy woman ; ” but he was a 
Scotchman, and had a Scotchman’s yearning, for an earthly 
possession, a lairdship ; Laird Simson — it would sound well ; 
the Laird o’ Blindpits, — for so Mr. Boston’s little property was 
called ; he was dazzled, and finally arranged an elopement 
with the heiress. 

Miss Boston was in her twenty-fourth year and of a strong 
mind, but she was in love ; it was the first time she had taken 
the disease, and as in fever, the circumstances, which in ordin- 
ary illness would have been in her favor, told powerfully 


BLINDPITS. 


15 


against her. Fever runs a desperate course in a strong human 
frame, and I apprehend love does the same in a strong- 
minded subject. 

As no one knew of Miss Boston’s purpose, no one remon- 
strated 5 remonstrance, however, would no doubt have been 
vain, but Providence was kind to her, as I think. She wrote 
a business-like letter to her father, telling him in a few words 
what she was about to do, placed it under the glass on her 
table that it might not be discovered too soon, and in the grey 
of the evening quietly left the house. Whether she thought 
of the feeble mother she was leaving behind I know not ; there 
are times when a great horror of selfishness seizes people. She 
left the house, and walked rapidly to the try sting-place — an 
old thorn-tree by the side of a footpath at the corner of a field 
— the man was not there ! She went back homewards, found 
her letter where she had left it untouched, and locked it in her 
desk to save herself the trouble of writing another; for she 
deemed that the occasion for it was only adjourned by some 
unlucky hitch. Next day, however, she heard that Simson 
was non inventus ; at the last moment his heart had failed 
him, and, in modem phrase, he had skedaddled to avoid the 
greatness that was to be thrust upon him ; or, perchance, he 
recalled a pair of eyes like sloes, and cheeks like a pulpit 
cushion, that were his ideal of feminine charms. He fled, and 
Miss Boston saw him no more. He fled, and both were no 
doubt saved a life of extra wretchedness. 

Prom a frightful storm, all the more terrible that it was 
mute and raged internally, Miss Boston emerged not con- 
spicuously changed. Not soured, or hardened, or mollified; 
she did not go distraught or fall into bad health. A loving 
eye watching her might have detected a difference ; but no 
such eye watched her. 

The death of her feeble ailing mother was the first wave 
that spent its force in partly obliterating her outraged feelings. 
Her'father survived several years, and then she was left sole 
heiress, and took up at once the role of eccentric elderly lady, 
went about in thick boots and broad-brimmed straw hat, and 


16 


BLINDPITS. 


farmed her own land vigorously. She was good and gener- 
ous hy fits and starts, and gave way to occasional outbursts 
of temper. One or two poor ladies in the neighborhood who 
visited her had no need to feel surprised at a thorough snub- 
bing, and probably they were not, for they took it meekly. 
Miss Boston never related the story of her grand mistake to 
any human being. Not when the very few friends of her 
youth visited her, and the hand-to-hand talk over the fire 
waxed confidential, and they laid hare their private histories 
to her — not at such an unguarded moment had she ever been 
betrayed into the weakness of making such a revelation. She 
was ashamed of it — not of her love, hut of the object of it. 
When she had come to herself, she was unutterably thankful 
that, she was there unshackled hy such a wretched tie. But 
still it had been a mistake that could not he rectified. That 
had gone out of her nature which could not he replaced or 
recalled. If she could have gossiped over it there might have 
been hope, as a copious perspiration throws off a cold. Many 
women, and men too, have been disappointed in this form ; hut 
they could love again, or almost as often as you like, with 
their kind of love — Miss Boston could not. If it had so been 
that she had chosen worthily and made a happy marriage, her 
love would have flowed on like a mighty river, beautifying all 
its borders ; as it w T as, it had been absorbed in the sand and 
was lost. Why this waste ? Ay, why indeed ? 

When a woman is fairly over the bar that crosses the en- 
trance of life — over it, whether well or ill — the years glide 
quickly hy ; and time did not stand still for Miss Boston. 
She farmed, and farmed well ; and she read newspapers, and 
history, and her Bible. She was not one of those ladies who 
can read nothing that has not a thread of story in it, and can 
read anything that has. She could not make personal comfort 
an object in life ; she was past middle age before she even put 
her hack to a chair or her foot on a stool, and to the end of her 
days she never lay down on a sofa. She had been often mild- 
ly advised to alter her house, and refurnish it to suit the 
progress of the times, hut she scouted the idea. Why, every 


BLINDPITS. 


17 


petty tradesman that made a few pounds must have a fine 
house, and a lot of showy rickety furniture in it. No ; there 
was more need of an example the other way. The outer crust 
of eccentricity grew and hardened with years, hut her nature 
softened, as everything good at the core does ; time will sour 
small beer, but it mellows a generous vintage. And so, 
whether she was aware of it or not, Miss Boston figured for 
many years as a character in the place, and then died, to be 
the occasion of my relating this story. 


CHAPTER III. 


* 


It is a trying thing for a woman to he always with children 
without having the divine right of mother in them. It is not 
to he wondered at that, in the lapse of years, women so cir- 
cumstanced should develop into individuals fitted to remind 
you that life is a grind ; it is the natural course of things, and 
Miss Barclay did not altogether escape it. She had a very 
strict eye to the proprieties ; she exacted all her dues, and she 
clad commonplace ideas in a roundabout style, and grammar 
irritatingly correct ; hut she had a genial heart and a sunny 
temperament, which counterbalanced these small vices that 
leaned to virtue’s side. When I think of her laborious self- 
denying life, and the brave spirit that carried her through it, 
I am ashamed to have hinted at these blemishes. 

To work hard all day, to return wearied in the evening, and 
exert herself to cheer her mother ; with a soul which naturally 
devised liberal things, to he compelled to plan farthing savings, 
and to have a sickening anxiety, every time the postman 
knocked, as to what news from her absent brothers — had for 
years been the routine of her life, varied occasionally by 
coming to some desperate strait that seemed impassable, only 
that time never stops, and must needs carry on the wretched 
as well as other people. Then death stepped in, and anxiety 
was lost in grief ; but one of her brothers left her a legacy 
that sweetened life to her — his only child Bessie Barclay, 
whose mother was also dead. Aunt Barbara took the orphan 
home, and it never once occurred to her that in doing so she 
was adding to her burdens. 


BLINDPITS. 


19 


Her brother left her yet another legacy which did not 
sweeten her life, — which embittered it for years, and taxed her 
energies more ways than one, and which finally told terribly 
against her when in a position the last in which she could 
have expected to find herself. She had become surety for a 
debt of £300 incurred by him. Was this honest ? How, out 
of the best salary she could expect in her profession, was she 
- to live and pay a debt of £300 ? There was an ugly wrinkle 
in the story which she never unfolded to human eye ; she 
stood the suspicion of folly and dishonesty, even when in ex- 
tremity, rather than unveil her brother’s error — error she 
called it, and excused him for it to herself on various grounds. 
He had asked her to be security for a loan of £30 ; she hesi- 
tated but consented ; and he put a cypher to the 30, and dy- 
ing, left nothing behind him but his daughter and debt, for 
£300 of which she found herself responsible. Her creditor, 
aware of her circumstances, had generously foregone his in- 
terest ; he was a man of means, and in effect it would have 
mattered little to him to have lost such a sum, but he regularly 
gave Mrs. Barclay a receipt for the few pounds with which for 
years she nibbled at the great body of her debt. Whether 
the possibility of frankly forgiving it ever occurred to him is 
hard to say ; but he never did so, and Miss Barclay never for 
an instant imagined he could. She had read few novels, and 
very few generous spirits had crossed her path ; justice was all 
she expected, and here, to her surprise and gratitude, she was 
getting more than justice. 

Miss Barclay did not marry; I can easily imagine why. 
Certainly not because she had been, as the phrase is, disap- 
pointed in love ; that in her case was nearly impossible ; she 
was judicious in all her feelings and actions, and to suppose 
her acting the part Miss Boston did in her youth, would be 
simply outrageous. Hot that she could not love ; she could 
love deeply and long, but she could not love quickly, and in 
her narrow sphere she had never met with any one who 
induced her to think long enough about him ; besides, had 
she not her household to provide for ? And of late she had 


20 


BLINDPITS. 


added another member to her household, on the recommenda- 
tion of Mrs. Leadbetter, the mother of her pupils. Miss 
Dobbie was an elderly lady, who from some disastrous circum- 
stances found herself penniless ; her relatives had subscribed 
to buy her a small annuity, and were glad to see her under 
Mrs. Barclay’s roof. Barbara had feared the experiment on 
her mother’s account, but it answered marvellously. Miss 
Dobbie was an object on whom the elder lady could expend 
her talk with the certainty of sympathy and appreciation. 
She was singularly inoffensive ; if she had possessed a thimble- 
ful of robust common-sense she would have been an acquisi- 
tion. She was a little woman, who had been half-a-century 
in this world, with amazingly small result apparently. She 
had been pretty, having neat features and a very bright com- 
plexion ; the features were neat still, but the complexion — the 
white had grown tarnished, and the red had broken up into 
fine thready streaks. Her hair was thin and would have been 
gray if left to the freedom of its own will, but she spent a 
good deal of her time in the retirement of her own room, sit- 
ting with her head covered with blotting-paper steeped in a 
decoction warranted to make red or grey hair a glossy black ; 
the result in Miss Dobbie’s case was a shade of purple, but 
she was pleased — she shrank from a front. Her hair notwith- 
standing, she had not apparently come to the knowledge that 
she was no longer young ; there had been few milestones in 
her life, and crow-feet and gray hairs come on so very gradu 
ally — a beneficent arrangement, no doubt, meant to break the 
fact of decay to us as gently as possible ; and having seen no 
sudden marked change in herself — there being no tall lad or 
slim maiden by her side — she still dressed youthfully, and 
would place a flush of pink ribbons below her little withered 
chin in perfect good faith. And why not ? It harmed no 
one, and every woman has not the grim good sense to surren- 
der her colors, and walk knowingly into the gloomy tenement 
of old age. 

You have the household: old lady Mrs. Barclay, elderly lady 
Miss Dobbie, elderly young lady Miss Barclay, young girl 


BLINDPITS. 


21 


Bessie Barclay, young maid-of-all-work Katy. I daresay in 
every town and city there are many such households of 
stranded women, you would say ; hut if day and way can he 
met, don’t fancy that they are at all dolorous. The great ma- 
jority of women are blessed with the power of relieving their 
cares and sorrows as dogs perspire — not to he coarse — through 
the tongue. 

Of an afternoon, while Bessie was conning the lessons which 
she was to say to her aunt in the evening, Mrs. Barclay would 
look from her side of the fireplace across to Miss Dobbie at the 
other, and ask 11 if she felt comfortable ; for in a closet this 
size it is always too hot or too cold. Little did I think, at one 
time of my life, that I would ever live in a place like this, 
Miss Dobbie; if Mr. Barclay were to look up he wouldn’t 
credit it ; if my sons had lived ” — and here Mrs. Barclay 
stopped, broke down, and put her handkerchief to her eyes. 

“ Or if I had not lost my money, Mrs. Barclay,” rejoined 
Miss Dobbie ; “ but it’s a world of change. When I think of 
the time that I lived with Miss Davie — Miss Davie kept a 
most select boarding-school, and moved in the best society — 
the highest style of Christian gentlewoman she was. I was 
an orphan, with neither sister nor brother ; and she was a 
mother to me. I stayed with her after my education was 
finished, and I might have married from her house ; but she 
said, / a happy marriage is an excellent thing, only, Jane Dob- 
bie, don’t throw yourself away.’ She didn’t like cousin Drank ; 
he is a married man now with a large family — Dobbie of Dob- 
biestanes. I mind one night dancing with him. I can see 
the gown I had on. I’ll let you see it,” and she went to her 
room and came back with a thing that looked like a very gay 
tail for a kite ; but it was only some yards of ribbon with a 
bit of every gown she had ever had strung on it. She selected 
the gown in question, and Mrs. Barclay looked at it with 
interest ; even Bessie left her books to see it. 

“ I had a gown the very same as that,” exclaimed Mrs. 
Barclay ! “ I mind it so well ; your grandpapa, Bessie, 

brought it to me not long after your papa was born.” 


22 


BLINDPITS. 


u What a singular coincidence ! ” cried Miss Dobbie ; “ and 
how was it made ? ” 

That Mrs. Barclay couldn’t tell ; but Miss Dobbie could and 
did tell how hers was made, and all the adjuncts of her dress 
that night she danced with cousin Frank ; her memory was 
good, and it had not been burdened with much but the 
uneventful events of her own span of life. Many an hour she 
whiled away telling the beads of this peculiar rosary, or 
meditating over them : balls, parties, picnics, conversations, 
sermons — even sermons with texts, heads, and particulars — 
were all pinned to these remnants of faded grandeur. 

By tea-time the two ladies had talked themselves into an 
appetite, and when Miss Barclay came in with a paper bag 
full of nice things, they were in a humor to enjoy them. 
Barbara never forgot any of those little attentions, the 
remembering of which is so much more >tlian the things 
themselves, and gives a kind of fictitious bloom even to life 
on the wane. She excelled in diffusing a cheering comfort 
round her ; there were no loose ends in her housekeeping, and 
she had taught common things to a series of girls with such 
marked success, that she deserved a testimonial as a good 
servant of the state ; and further, she kept sight of them in 
after-life, and was always ready with help and advice, which 
she did not distribute in brief lectures delivered from a 
pedestal, but in a quiet womanly way, thus gaining love and 
gratitude, when she did not think she had done anything to 
deserve either. People on the gape for gratitude rarely get 
it; if they are always meeting with shocking ingratitude, be 
sure there is a flaw in the administration of the article they 
demand it for. There is no forcing-house for such growths of 
human nature as love, gratitude, and respect ; they are sensi- 
tive plants — if you catch at them they will shrink ; but there 
are imitations of them, better and worse, always to be had for 
a price. 

If Miss Dobbie had stepped directly from her genteel inde- 
pendence into Mrs. Barclay’s lofty and limited abode, she 
might not have been such a satisfactory inmate ; but for 


BLINDPITS. 


23 


several years she had been trying to fill situations for which 
she was wholly unfit, and glad was she to find herself at last 
under Miss Barclay’s wing, by whom her little foibles were 
overlooked, and her modest wants attended to with what in 
time became loving care, which she repaid by any little service 
in her power. 

Mrs. Barclay and Miss Bobbie had two common grounds on 
which they could meet and hold sweet fellowship, — the one 
was their trials, the other was their gentility. Miss Bobbie’s 
trials paled in the light of Mrs. Barclay’s, because Mrs. Bar- 
clay had the better gift of utterance, and was persuaded no 
one ever wms afflicted as she had been and was ; whereas Miss 
Bobbie spoke of her catamites in the past tense, and had 
reached a tortoise-shell-cat contentment — was glad of a 
friendly hearth to bask on, and a friendly hand to stroke her. 

They had not much society, these ladies, but what they had 
was of a kind they had the pleasure of patronizing, — such as 
Mrs. Bods, their neighbor, a lady of fresh countenance and 
such jolly dimensions that her head looked like a bobbin set 
on the top of a barrel ; if she had ever had a neck, it had 
sunk in the ocean of shoulders. She generally, when in com- 
pany at least had a broad smile on her face ; and she had only 
to shake her shoulders, -which she had a trick of doing, and 
you had laughter holding both his sides. The two genteel 
ladies, who had been accustomed to move in the best society, 
would have been ashamed to say how welcome Mrs. Bods’s 
visits were ; and they generally remarked to each other, after 
she left, as an apology for their condescension, “ Mrs. Bods is 
such a kind person, always ready to do you any little service 
— uncommonly kind.” Mrs. Bods, on her side, imparted to 
her lodger her opinion, “ that they werena ill bodies, but gey 
upsetting if they could get away wi’t.” Mrs. Bods kept 
lodgers ; — most people in that locality had more than one iron 
in the fire wherewith to weld the struggle for life. 

Beside her sedate, sensible aunt, with her trim, plump 
figure, and dress that always fitted like a glove, and the other 
ladies getting into years and oddities, Bessie Barclay looked 


24 


BLINDPITS. 


like a creature that had got into the house by mistake. She 
was young, fair, and blithe. - Her aunt might try to keep up 
her governessy manner while teaching her, but it was of no 
use ; Bessie broke down all fences, and Miss Barclay could but 
relax into a smile and give in. Mrs. Dods being present 
when she was reading one evening, said — 

“ Bessie, ye read better than the minister.” 

“ Very much better,” Bessie agreed. 

“Yes, Bessie,” said Miss Barclay, “you read very well; I 
trust before long you will be filling a place as an efficient 
teacher.” 

“Teacher, aunt Bar. I’m not going to be a teacher — I’ve 
no patience for it.” 

“ You must cultivate patience, dear : unfortunately circum- 
stances render it necessary that you employ yourself in some 
profitable way, and what else could you do ? ” 

“ Lots of things ; I could keep a shop — a baker’s shop for 
instance.” 

Mrs. Barclay groaned ; what, she thought, would Mr. Bar- 
clay have said to his granddaughter keeping a baker’s shop ? 
Miss Dobbie shivered a small shiver. Aunt Bar. smiled at her 
niece’s wit, and said, “ It is not a particularly lucrative occupa- 
tion, I believe.” 

“ From 12s. to 20s. a-week. I would get 20s. in a west-end 
shop,” said Bessie, “ and I could live on that.” 

“It’s trying for the breath,” said Mrs. Dods. “Ye ken I 
ken fine what it is ; it was a’ I could do to stand it ; ilka 
batch that comes in, the shop’s filled wi’ steam, and there’s 
aye batches cornin’ in.” 

“ My health would stand it capitally — it would be as good 
as a vapor-path — and it’s a simple business. I’ve enough 
mental arithmetic for it ; all you have to do is to give a penny- 
worth more to everybody that buys a shilling’s worth, and to 
send a cake of shortbread to all your customers at the Hew 
Year.” 

“ That used to be the way,” said Mrs. Dods, “ but it’s out o’ 
the fashion now.” 


BLINDPITS. 


25 


“ Then that’ll be my first reform, to bring hack that excel- 
lent fashion.” 

a But it comes hard on the bakers too ; a cake o’ shortbread 
is little to ilka body, hut twa-three hundred’s a heap to the 
baker.” 

u That’s the other side of the question. I’ll think over it ; 
there’s plenty of time to think or do anything in a baker’s 
shop. I notice there are certain times people go for bread, the 
rest of the time you can do anything you like — keep a hook in 
the counter-drawer and read when you like.” 

“ That’s your notion o’ keepin’ a shop, is’t ? ” said Mrs. 
Bods ; “weel, if ye get muckle read it’s mair than I did. 
Brae the bet rows in the morning till the last loaf at nicht I 
was never olf my feet ; then, frae the time o’ the first rhubarb, 
till the last apple that’s in the country, there’s nae~ end to the 
tarts and pies sent to cover and fire, and, afore ye keep sicht 
o’ them a’, and see them a’ sent to richt folk at the richt time, 
ye’ll no make muckle o’ your hook. I mind there was a leddy 
had ae bawbee row sent to her every morping; and ance, 
when there was a new laddie that didna ken about things, I 
forgot the row ; weel, she cam and kicket up sic a dust about 
it, ye wad hae thocht I had done something I should hae been 
hanged for, and I had to apologize and he unco ceevil a’ the 
time I was just burstin’ to gie her a hit o’ my mind. Folk 
that keeps shops hae a hantle to put up wi’.” 

“ I don’t know the position in life,” said Miss Barclay, 
“ where people have not a very great deal to tolerate and over- 
look.” 

“ When I lived with Miss Davie,” Miss Dobbie was begin- 
ning, when a deep sigh from Mrs. Barclay startled her into 
silence. No one took any notice of it, and Bessie went on — 
“ Then, if shopkeeping won’t do, I could train myself to sing 
at concerts, or give readings : three guineas a-night people get 
for singing at concerts, that’s eighteen guineas a-week, which 
is 936 guineas per annum. I don’t know if they get as much 
for reading, but say from £500 to £600 a-year — we could do 
very well on that.” 

2 


* 


26 


BLINDPITS. 


u Bessie, my dear,” said her grandmamma, with sudden 
animation, “ 1 could not approve of your father’s daughter 
becoming a public singer, but reading is different — that’s an 
accomplishment anj 1- lady might exercise without demeaning 
herself; if you could get £500 or £600 a-year for doing that, 
I for one would not object.” 

Mrs. Dod’s smile had been gathering on her face, and her 
shoulders shook as she said, “Na, when she gets it, ye mauna 
object to £600 a-year — it’s no to be picket aff ilka door-step.” 

“£600 a-year won’t keep a carriage,” said Miss Bobbie. 
“ Miss Davie kept a carriage, and hired horses as we needed 
them — fully a better plan than having them of one’s own. 
Cousin Drank has a remarkably pretty turn-out just now — 
dark claret and a pair of grays. I saw it on the street the 
other day ; Mrs. Dobbie was in it ; she did not see me ; she’ll 
likely be calling one of these days.” 

Miss Barclay had not a quick sense of the absurd, but she 
had common sense, and she felt uncomfortable at the marked 
contrast between the actual circumstances and the strain of 
talk the ladies had got into. She did not object at all to their 
mounting their high horses in private, but she hastened to say, 
“Meantime, Bessie, you had better pay attention to youx 
lessons, if you have to teach ” 

“Teach!” said Mrs. Dods ; “what’s she to do teaching, or 
singing, or reading either ? — the lassie ’ll be getting a man 
some day. But I maun awa’ and get on the parritch ; Mr. 
Pettigrew’ll be in as hungry as a hawk.” Mr. Pettigrew was 
her lodger. 

“bTo, auntie, I’ll never marry; I’ll always live with you 
and grandmamma.” 

“ You may marry or you may not, Bessie, my love ; but 
your present duty is to attend to your lessons — a good educa- 
tion is never out of place in any position in life.” 

“Most women marry — why are you not married, Aunt 
Bar. ? « 

“ For the same reason that may probably prevent you 
marrying, Bessie ; but it’s a subject I don’t consider altogether 
suitable for discussing with you.” 


BLINDPITS. 


27 


“ Your aunt and I, dear, were very particular,” said 3\liss 
Dobbie, briskly. “ Miss Davie was a lady on whose judgment 
I placed the utmost reliance, and she always said, 1 Jane 
Dobbie, don’t throw yourself away.’ ” 

“ But people may be married without throwing themselves 
away ; for instance, if Aunt Bar. were to marry Mr. Petti — 99 

“ Bessie ! 99 said Miss Barclay, in a warning voice. 

“ Marry who ? 99 asked grandmamma. 

“ Oh, never mind ; I was just speaking nonsense,” said 
Bessie. 

“ Miss Davie did not altogether disapprove of nonsense,” 
said that deceased lady’s friend ; a she used to say that some 
people’s nonsense was better than other people’s sense.” 

“ But mine isn’t,” said Bessie ; u and no nonsense, I know, 
could hold the candle to Aunt Bar’s sense.” 

“ Then, once more, Bessie, my sense says, learn your 
lessons ; you’ve never really set about them to-night.” 

“ Here goes then, Aunt Bar.” 


CHAPTER IV. 


Miss Barclay had laid the Bible on the table preparatory 
to reading from it to her small household — her way of shut- 
ting in the day ; when the door-hell was heard to ring. 

“ Who can that he at this time of night ? ” said Miss 
Dobbie, who had* economically changed her cap when the 
chance of visitors seemed over, and was afraid of being 
caught. A creak and a stride were heard in the passage, the 
door burst open, and a big tall man, in a greatcoat, having a 
shepherd’s plaid twisted round his neck, wearing his hat, and 
with a bright-colored carpet-bag in his hand, entered. He 
dropped the bag and took off his hat, revealing a head small 
in proportion to his body, covered with long reddish hair, part 
of which dangled over one eye, and was being swept up every 
now and then with his hand — a hand of no ordinary size and 
hairy below the knuckles. In this formidable implement he 
imprisoned Mrs. Barclay’s fingers closely, while he said, “ I 
hope you are well, mem ; ” then, striding across the hearth, 
he said to Miss Dobbie, “ And how are you . — not feeling this 
change of weather ? Are you troubled with rheumatism ? ” 
Imagine a man in his senses proposing rheumatism to Miss 
Dobbie. She said, “ Sir ? ” 

But Mrs. Barclay held out her hand pleasantly, and asked 
him to take a seat, which he did, remarking that Mrs. Dods 
was out, and as he hadn’t his key, he would wait for a little. 
Then he observed the Bible, and said, “ I see you have just 
been going to take the Books. I’ll conduct the exercise, 
which may be agreeable as there is no male head of the 
house.” 


BLINDPITS. 


29 


Mrs. Barclay bowed and siglied deeply. Bessie clutched her 
chair vigorusly with one hand, to try to prevent herself gig- 
gling outright. 

“ We’ll not sing,” said Mr. Pettigrew; “for Mrs. Dods will 
think I’m late enough.” 

Miss Barclay looked warningly at her niece, who suddenly 
recovered her gravity. 

“ Where are you reading ? ” Mr. Pettigrew asked. “ You 
began Lamentations last time I was here.” 

“We shall go on with Lamentations to-night, please, Mr. 
Pettigrew,” said Bessie demurely. 

“ You will find a mark,” interposed Miss Barclay, “ at the 
27tli chapter of Acts.” • 

It mattered little to Mr. Pettigrew whether he read the 
lofty strains concerning her that sat solitary and desolate as a 
widow among the nations, or the life-like account of Paul’s 
shipwreck. He had a powerful voice ; but of the use or abuse 
of it he had no notion. You could not gather from his read- 
ing whether he understood what he read, far less felt it. If 
you can conceive of a stick of sound, or a string of sound, you 
may have some idea of it ; and his prayer ! — it had more the 
effect of the rapid running down of a machine that had been 
set to go a quarter of an hour than anything else. He got 
off his knees, and almost in a breath with his last words, said, 
“ I’ll be stepping. Good-night to you, ladies.” With a gen- 
eral look round he grasped his bag and walked off. 

“ How, Bessie,” said Miss Barclay, when they were alone, 
“you must give up that style of joking about Mr. Pettigrew. 
It is coarse and very unladylike. I advise you also not to 
make a butt of him. Hot that he is aware of it ; but it is a 
very low kind of enjoyment for you, if you do enjoy it ; and 
if lie were aware of it, it would be very unkind.” 

“ I’ll try to be good ; but one can’t be perfect, Aunt Bar.” 

“ Ho ; but one can aim at perfection.” 

“ I’ll never be so good as you, auntie. What would Miss 
Bobbie think of hearing herself prayed for as the silly sheep 
that had happily wandered into our fold ? ” 


30 


BLINDPITS. 


u I don’t think she would recognise herself by the description 
at all.” 

“ He is an absurd gomeral, Mr. Pettigrew.” 

“Now, there you are again, Bessie. I believe he is a good 
man, though not refined or sensitive.” 

“ Auntie, you are too good for this world.” Then, a minute 
after, “ I say, auntie, an epidemic has broken out among my 
niglitcap-strings, three have cracked off one after another ; in 
that case what would you advise ? ” 

“ I advise you to mend them all thoroughly to-morrow.” 

u Them all ! to-morrow — 0 auntie ; but I may call in Miss 
Bobbie with her instruments, as consulting physician ; may I 
not ? ” • 

“ I would rather you did it yourself, Bessie. I would like 
you to grow useful and thoughtful. You are not quite a child 
now.” 

“ Ho, indeed ; I am sixteen past.” 

“ I was little older than that when I began to teach, Bessie, 
and you know the money I get is what we have to live on. I 
never told you our circumstances particularly, for I could not 
have borne to see a child with a little careworn facey going 
about. I w r anted your childhood to be as bright and happy as 
I could make it, so I have kept all my small sordid cares to 
myself, but now I would like you to'think seriously, and my 
experience is that it is no great hardship to have to work for 
one’s-self. I have known a good many idle ladies, and they 
are not to be envied, I assure you.” 

“ 0 aunt, do you think so ? I would think it delightful to 
have plenty of money and not to need to do anything but what 
I liked.” 

“ Well, that’s always the class of people I pity. If people 
are to be happy they must work ; even to be able to eat and 
sleep, people must work. Pew persons have the energy and 
determination to go on working unless they are compelled. I 
have seen ladies tired of themselves and everything, actually 
losing their health merely from having nothing to do, or doing 
nothing, or at least nothing they had any satisfaction in look- 
ing back on.” 


BLINDPITS. 


31 


“ I always thought work was a punishment, and I think so 
yet, auntie, hut I would not mind working occasionally as a 
change ; and I think you could do very well with less than 
you have, and when the old lady at Blindpits leaves us her 
money — I heard grandmamma telling Mrs. Dods about it the 
other day — it will he very nice.” 

“Bessie, Bessie! Miss Boston may, I hope she will, live 
many many, years yet; hut if she were to die to-morrow, it is 
most probable that she won’t leave us a farthing ; — grand- 
mamma wishes it, hut that’s all the ground she has to go 
upon.” 

“ Then that’s funny, for I heard her say she had often 
wished you to borrow on it.” 

Miss Barclay groaned in spirit ; it seemed as if all the 
effects of her own teaching had been dispelled by the foolish 
talking of her mother. 

“Would any one lend on such security, Bessie? But I am 
thankful I have never needed to borrow ; and, Bessie, it would 
he sinful as well as foolish to fold our hands in expectation of 
Miss Boston’s money.” 

“ If I could do anything, auntie,, hut I am quite sure I 
couldn’t go on teaching from year to year as you do ; don’t 
you think I might he trained to sing at concerts ? I think my 
voice is marketable.” 

“ Bessie, I could never allow that ; ” and Miss Barclay 
thought of her niece’s youth and beauty. 

“ Nor reading ? ” 

“ Nor reading either. I don’t object to the things, or to 
other people doing them, hut I could not let you ; and after 
all, if you are to make anything of them, they require as 
much assiduous labor and attention, or more even, than teach- 
ing.” 

“ It must he an awful thing teaching — the A B C for in- 
stance. Have you ever taught the ABC, auntie ? ” 

“ Many times.” 

“ And how did you like it ? ” 

“ I did not like it. I do a great many things I don’t like.” 


32 


BLINDPITS. 


11 But tlie ABC! I’ll try to be good, auntie, and plod- 
ding.” 

Miss Barclay had not ruled her niece with an iron rule, 
She began to blame berself for her lax discipline as probably 
tending to make Bessie unfit for her lot ; but had she exerted 
on her behalf all the unyielding firmness that made her out' 
door pupils always so respectful and obedient, she might have 
made her different a little from what she was, but she could 
never have turned out a second edition of herself. 


CHAPTER V. 


Bessie Barclay’s grand resource both as to work and 
amusement was books. How two, or at most three, books per 
annum quite sufficed for the wants of the other members of 
the household, and Aunt Barbara had never joined a library, 
— it did not strike her as one of the necessaries of life ; but 
although she did not at all approve of miscellaneous reading, 
no doubt she would have indulged Bessie in this, only Mr. 
Dods — Mrs. Dods’s husband — supplied her wants. Perhaps 
you thought Mrs. Dods was a widow — not at all ; only she 
kept the pot boiling, and Mr. Dods had to walk softly. As 
you will infer, he had been a baker, but had not baked to 
much purpose. He was, and had always been, addicted to 
books, and at one time had been fond of his tumbler; these 
tastes perhaps had something to do with his non-success in 
business. He had a property from which he drew a net 
revenue of twelve pounds per annum ; out of that sum he had 
to find himself in everything but food. Eirst and last he had 
collected a good many books, and books of reputation, and 
for the time they had been neighbors Bessie Barclay had had 
the benefit of them. 

Mrs. Dods -was not slow to declare that they were “just a 
wlieen rubbish, fit for nothing but to take up room and gather 
dust ; ” but she allowed them to stand on some shelves in the 
passage behind the door — a situation perfectly dark — and she 
on no pretext would allow the gas to be lit during the day : 
but Mr. Dods could generally put his hand on what he 
wanted, and if not, he kept a box of lucifers in a corner, and 
2 * 


34 


BLIKDPITS. 


drew one to help his search, carefully putting the extinct 
match in his pocket, for to leave it lying about was to bring 
reproof about his ears. He was a thin man, with bent 
shoulders and a cadaverous complexion. He despised Petti- 
grew for his ignorance, for his hoorishness, and because it is a 
comfort to despise somebody. Also he felt savage when he 
thought of a creature like Pettigrew having in a measure the 
command of the public ear ; while he, Thomas Dods, had 
found door after door barred in his face when he wanted but a 
few minutes’ speech with the public. 

Mr. Pettigrew, it may be said, was what in Scotland is 
called a probationer. He had been on his probation for fifteen 
years, and during that time had preached as constantly as he 
was paid for it ; to preach gratuitously did not strike him as 
fulfilling the end of preaching. 

Mr. Dods was a poet, and he would have been content — 
content ! he would have been jubilant — if he could only have 
seen one of his brain-children decently clad in print, all sordid 
considerations apart, for he was not mercenary ; but oh ! if he 
could have sold one absolutely, how gladly he would have 
done so ; that woujd have silenced Mrs. Dods for ever j for, 
like too many of the wives of geniuses, she would have appre- 
ciated her husband’s talents if they could have been trans- 
muted into hard cash ; as it was, she gave the palm to Petti- 
grew, who for fifteen years had lived on ten sermons, and even 
saved money. It is open to all men to deserve success, but to 
few to command ; so Mr. Dods submitted to his fate, retaining 
always the consolation of looking down on Mr. Pettigrew 
openly when his wife was in good humor, privately when she 
was not. 

He could not gain the public ear, but he must have a confi- 
dant, and he had two. They did not know each other, so 
there could be no collusion, and if each independently thought 
so highly of his verses they must be good. When he took in 
Mr. Pichardson’s (his, or rather his wife’s, other lodger) hot 
water of a morning, he would begin reading his last effusion. 
Richardson would say, “ That’s good, Mr. Dods, very good, 


BLINDPITS. 


35 


immensely superior to most of the so-called poetry that’s pub- 
lished ; if I had any influence with editors you would see that 
in print, hut I’m sorry to say I have none, and it’s all influ- 
ence that does it.” Then Mr. Dods’s head, that hung forward 
as if it were too heavy for his long, slender neck, would raise 
itself a little, and a glow would suffuse his sallow face, and he 
would lay the breakfast in a kind of dream, muttering, “ Yes, 
it’s all influence, all influence.” And when Bessie Barclay 
popped in during the afternoon, as she often did, and kept 
him company while he was dusting Mr. Bichardson’s sitting- 
room, he would produce the poem to her, and she would say, 
“ Oh, Mr. Dods, I could fancy that Gray or Collins.” He 
modelled himself on the older poets ; the modern school of 
poetry was unintelligible to him. “ Yes,” he rejoined, “ Mr. 
Bichardson tells me it’s quite another thing from most of the 
trash that’s printed now-a-days.” 

“ You should get it printed, Mr. Dods.” 

“ It’s easy speaking, but Mr. Bichardson says it’s no merit 
that’s the thing, it’s influence, and I believe it ; an ounce of 
influence with an editor is worth a pound o’ merit.” 

“ That’s very unfair,” cries Bessie, warmly; “I wonder 
they don’t see they’re standing in their own light.” 

“ They know what suits their public best probably,” said 
Mr. Dods, loftily ; “ before some things are appreciated, you 
must educate the public taste up to them.” 

“ Tammas,” said Mrs. Dods, showing her face at the door, 
“ if you’re dune wi’ that room, ye had better be parin’ the 
taties.” 

It is quite true that, even in his happiest moments of in- 
spiration, Mr. Dods was exposed to interruptions of this kind; 
nay, more, he was expected to keep all the tins and brasses in 
the house bright, and the bane of his life was three pairs and 
a half of candlesticks that never were used, and a brass pan 
that was only used once a-year, but which, nevertheless, had 
to be kept in a high state of polish : it was worse than vain to 
suggest that they might be disposed of in some way. “Ha, 
na, Tammas,” Mrs. Dods would say ; “ye’re better polisliing 


36 


BLINDPITS. 


them than yer verses, — the verses are never seen, hut the 
candlesticks are the ornament o’ the kitchen, and ye maun 
just educate yer taste up to them.” When in the humor, Mrs. 
Dods could tip her arrows with poison. 

But worse even than candlesticks, Mr. Dods had to polish 
the hoots of the house. If you have ever at all entered into 
Samson’s feelings when he was grinding for the Philistines, 
you may be able to form some distant idea of how Mr. Dods 
was affected when he was cleaning Pettigrew’s hoots. In ad- 
dition to these labors, Mr. Dods was expected to turn up his 
sleeves, don an apron, and set to work whenever any article 
was wanted for household consumption, into the composition 
of which flour entered ; possibly, if he had sent some of his 
triumphs in this line to editors, they might have been more 
appreciated than his poems. 

Mr. Pettigrew did not get many letters ; hut he was always 
expecting some of the last importance. If any of Mr. Dods’s 
children were out, trying to push their way in the world, he 
was always expecting letters of the highest moment also ; 
consequently, when the postman’s ring occurred, it was often 
a neck-or-nothing race which should he first at the door. If 
Mr. Pettigrew got the letters, he did not let them out of his 
hands till he had examined them at his leisure, making a 
running commentary on them all the time — 11 Graham Rich- 
ardson, Esq. — London postmark — woman’s hand — has Rich- 
ardson friends in London ? I could easily find that out — 
Richardson, Richardson — I think they’re all for him together — 
what’s this ? ” and he looked at a thick oblong packet, gay 
with postage stamps ; he weighed it in his hand, scrutinized 
the post-mark, and then said, “ I think, Mr. Dods, this is for 
you.” 

“ Think ! give it to me instantly,” cried Mr. Dods. 

Mr. Dods, though filled with contempt and anger, is granted 
enough presence of mind to take the packet as a thing of 
course, to lay it down, to pick up Mr. Richardson’s letters, and 
take them to that gentleman’s room, to return (Mr. Pettigrew 
hanging about all the while), drop the bulky missive into his 


BLINDPITS. 


37 


pocket, take up tke newspaper and begin to read, or to affect 
to read, for although his eyes were on the page, his mind was 
in the bottom of his pocket. 

“ Are you not going to read it ? ” said Mr. Pettigrew, impa- 
tiently. 

“ Yes, I was thinking of reading it, but if you want it” — 
and he held out the newspaper. Mr. Pettigrew retired, assur- 
ing himself that sooner or later he would master the contents 
of that letter. 

Mrs. Dods was out, but she might come in immediately; 
moreover, Pettigrew could invent an errand to bring him to 
the kitchen at any moment, so Mr. Dods withdrew to Mr. 
Richardson’s sitting-room, and quietly turned the key upon 
himself. Hitherto, when he had sent his children out into 
the world, like Noah’s dove they had never come back to him ; 
of course he had duplicates, and if he had been roused from 
sleep at the dead of night he could have repeated them all 
from beginning to end ; but he knew this envelope was big 
with their fate, and he wanted no vulgar eye to watch his 
virgin feelings as he opened it. He found his offspring 
returned to him in good repair, and a note — his hand trem- 
bled as he held it. “ The editor of the Ironburgh Magazine 
begs to return Mr. D — ’s MSS. He regrets doing so, as they 

have very considerable merits. He would advise Mr. D 

to stick firmly to whatever trade or profession he has chosen, 
and to make poetry only the amusement of his leisure hours ; 
above all, to avoid publication till he is older and has seen 
more of the world, when his riper judgment will probably lead 
him to continue in the course pointed out.” 

The poor old man’s face was indeed a study as he read 
this ; one feels thankful that there was no rude, unsympa- 
thetic spirit present to witness it ; but with the infatuation, or 
shall we call it the happy fortune of his genus, lie fixed on the 
words in that brief note which to his eyes stood out in double 
pica — u very considerable merit.” The editor “ regretted ” 
returning them, then why did he do it ? was it possible ho 
might suppose a high price would be expected for them ; if 


38 


BLINDPITS. 


that were the case he might have them at his own price or for 
nothing — any or all of them. Merely to see them in print, 
only to see “ Ode to Spring,” by T. D., advertised among the 
contents of the Ironburg Magazine , would he ample reward. 
He would re-enclose them to the friendly editor, and let him 
know that they were entirely at his disposal. 

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you, Mr. Dods,” said Mr 
Richardson, who got the note to read at the earliest opportu- 
nity ; u there’s no use of making one’s-self too cheap.” Mr. 
Richardson did not attach the amount of meaning to the edi- 
tor’s u regret ” that the poet did ; he saw it as a polite phrase 
merely, or if used with consideration at all, only intended as an 
anodyne to the supposed youth’s mortified feelings at rejection, 
and he wanted to have Mr. Dods spared the pain of a second 
rebuff. 

“Much better to keep them for the use of your private 
friends and yourself, Mr. Dods. The man is no doubt a good 
judge, and he admits their excellence, hut what do the general 
public know of poetry ? If I could write poetry I would not 
he easily induced to publish it, I know.” 

“ May he, may he,” said Mr. Dods ; “ but isn’t it a queer 
notion o’ the man to think I’m a callant ? ” 

“ Well, I don’t know if it is ; it is the special characteristic 
of genius, you know, that it is always young. Ho, no ; I 
think the man showed his discernment there.” 

“ Well, if ye talc that view o’t ” 

“ To he sure, wliat other view could I take ? ” 

61 That didna strike me ; he says, * On no account publish 
till you’re older ; ’ if he kent I was up to the threescore he 
would think I hadna muckle time to put off.” 

Mr. Richardson had not time to pursue the subject further, 
and when he went away the big-type sentence, “ very consid- 
erable merit,” resumed its place in front of Mr. Dods’s eyes, 
his tongue kept constantly repeating it, it seemed to mix with 
the very blood in his body. He went through his work with 
a speed that astonished his wife, shaved himself and put on 
his best coat to call at Mrs. Barclay’s on the chance of a 
private interview with Bessie, that he might tell her the news. 


BLINDPITS. 


39 


Bessie was alone ; lier grandmamma was still in bed, and 
Miss Dobbie was in the retirement of her own room wearing 
her crown of blotting-paper. 

In a few minutes she bad the wonderful note in her hand. 
“ Oh, how funny that be should think you a hoy ! ” was her 
first exclamation; “he must not be so clever as the people 
who advertise that they will tell you your age, sex, and char- 
acter, if you send them a specimen of your writing and two 
dozen and a half postage-stamps.” 

“ I wondered at it myself, but Mr. Richardson seemed to 
think it no such an unnatural mistake.” 

“Well, when one thinks of it, neither it is; and this is 
from an editor J I wonder what like he is. It must he a disa- 
greeable business always sending things hack.” 

“ Ay, especially if he would like to keep them ; you see he 
regrets sending mine hack.” 

“ I see, because they have considerable merit.” 

“ Very considerable merit,” said Mr. Dods. 

“ That’s true, I’m sure, and I think they would look better 
in print than even in writing ; I wonder he did not keep 
them ; what could he the reason ? ’’ 

“ Dear kens,” said Mr. Dods ; “ maybe he would think I 
would bogle about terms ; I was thinking to send them hack 
and say I wad let him get them on his ain terms.” 

“ That’s the very thing to do,” cried Bessie ; “ how sur- 
prised aunt will fie when she sees them, and grandmamma, 
and Miss Dobbie, and everybody. Will he put one in next 
month ? — likely ; oh, it will be capital ! ” 

Mr. Dods saw the thing done ; the “ Ode to Spring ” was 
to he the first blossom of his fame, he would pluck the ripe 
fruit yet ; and he left Bessie thinking her a miracle of sense 
for her years. His thin frame expanded, his wrinkled cadav- 
erous face lighted up, as he went to the stationer’s and bought 
one big envelope and sixpence worth of stamps. That after- 
noon his offspring departed. 

“ I hope you got no bad news the day ? ” said Mr. Petti- 
grew, dropping in on his landlady while her husband was 
absent. 


40 


BLINDPITS. 


“ Bad news ! — wliat puts that in yer head? ” 

“ Mr. Hods got an uncommon-looking letter this morning, 
and seemed feared to open it.” 

“ A letter — and feared to open it ! I never heard tell o’t.” 

u He made a mystery of it tome; I have no wish to know 
anything about it, only if he is in any trouble I might be able 
to give a word of exhortation.” 

“ Trouble ! he’s in nae trouble or I wad hae heard o’t or 
this time, and I’m no that ill at exhortin’ mysel’. He’s been 
a simple man Tammas Hods, and the simple man’s the beg- 
gar’s brother ; but he wad hardly rin into ony new mischief 
an me no ken.” 

Mr. Pettigrew ensconced himself in a chair by Mrs. Hods’s 
fire ; she always had a good fire, and he had not, for he sup- 
plied his own coals ; besides, he was in the habit of sitting by 
the hour with his head nearly up the chimney, beating a 
tattoo on the upper bar of the grate, which he could hardly 
have done had he kept a roaring fire. 

The popular idea of the “sticket minister” is a thin, 
narrow-chested individual, studious, and of mental ability, but 
with a morbid consciousness destroying self-possession, and 
farther borne to the earth by a wretched disappointment in 
love. That class may exist by the dozen. Mr. Pettigrew, 
however, did not belong to it. In person he was large, broad- 
shouldered, and healthy ; in mind small, narrow, and healthy 
— there was not enough of it to harbor disease. What put it 
into his head to attempt the ministry he knows best, and how 
the net of the reverend fathers with whom he had to do on 
the way to his goal was so large in the mesh as to let him 
through, they know best. Looking at his physical frame, one 
would have said that he might have attained eminence if he 
had betaken himself to countries where men are famous as 
they bring down the axe upon the thick trees, but he had no 
notion of hard work or expatriation, and there he was a decent 
honest man, no doubt, who might have been respectable had 
he not been in a false position, out of which he did not think 
of extricating himself. 


BLINDPITS. 


41 


He sat and sunned himself in front of Mrs. Dods’s fire, em- 
ployed watching her operations. She had on her spectacles, 
and was picking peas for soup. 

“ How do you buy your split-pease ? ” asked he. 

“ Buy them ? ” 

“ Ay — do you buy them, in pounds, or how ? ” 

“ How wad I buy them but a pound or twa at a time ? ” 

“ Because if you were to buy a bushel at once it would be 
an immense saving.” 

“ A bushel ! whan wad Tammas an’ me eat a bushel o’ split- 
pease ? ” 

“ They’ll keep, Mrs. Dods — they’ll keep, and I would take 
the half of them.” 

“ Weel, keep or no keep, I’m no gaun to hae a bushel o’ 
split-pease in this house ; I’ve nae room for them, but if I had 
the mice wad dae naething but gulravitch amang them.” 

“ You should get a cat, Mrs. Dods.” 

“ That’s aye what Tammas says, whenever the mice dae any 
mischief, ‘ Oh, ye should get a cat.’ Well, if you an’ him ’ll just 
tak it atween ye to herd her an’ keep her off that dresser, ye’re 
welcome, but I’m gaun to be the slave o’ nae cat ; I made up 
my mind to that when I got the last ane out o’ the house — 
better pison them as Miss Barclay does.” 

“ Ay, she poisons them, does she ? What does she poison 
them with ? ” 

“ Arsenic ; but I dinna think it’s ower chancey a thing to 
hae about a house. She says she keeps it aye lockit up in 
her desk ; but I rather try the trap — see, there it’s an’ ye may 
set it if ye like, as ye’re no unco thrang. There’s a bit cheese, 
an’ gie’t a good birsel.” 

“ You’ll not know, Mrs. Dods, what Miss Barclay gets for 
keeping that Miss Dobbie ? ” 

“Ho ; I never speired,” said Mrs. Dods, sharply. 

“ Ho ; but she might have told you.” 

“But she didna. She can keep her thumb on her ain con- 
cerns as weel as some mair o’ us, Peter ; but then she disna 
howk into other folk’s affairs either. If ye w T ant to get to 


42 


BLINDPITS. 


the bottom o’ things, try the auld wife.” (Imagine Mrs. Bar- 
clay hearing herself described as the “ auld wife.”) 

“ They spoil that girl Betsjr among them,” said Mr. Petti- 
grew. 

“ I’ll no say that ; hut Miss Barclay’s wonderful fond o’ 
her. I warrant she’s lost as mony nights’ sleep thinking 
about her as if she had been her mother.” 

“ No, Mrs. Dods, the same solicitude does not reside in the 
bosom of an aunt ; hut no doubt she is in loco parentis.” 

“Weel, ye had better be loco-parentising yourself out o’ 
this ; for I’m gaun to clean up the fireside an’ mak a stour.” 

Mr. Pettigrew, having manipulated the mousetrap, retired 
to his own small chamber, to meditate on Mr. Dods’s letter, 
and, most probably, on the great split-pea question and cog- 
nate topics. 

Mr. Dods came in at the dinner-hour, and his wife waited 
to hear if he would disclose, of his own accord, the news of 
the mysterious letter. Mr. Dods had got into those habits of 
silence which people learn who rarely have a sympathising 
audience ; and, though still in a little excitement, he did not 
speak. He thought coyly of his secret, as a girl does of her 
first love. His wife sat watching him as he ate his soup 
absently, with sometimes a kind of smile on his face. Her 
temper did not improve as she sat thinking of the trials and 
burdens that had been the staple of her married life. 

“What letter did ye get this morning, Tammas?” she 
broke forth sharply and suddenly. 

“Letter?” he said, gaining a moment’s time to think 
whether he would reveal his treasure, or keep it till a yet more 
triumphant moment. 

“Ay, letter,” said his wife. “ It wadna he a tax-paper, or I 
wad hae gotten’t soon eneuch.” 

Yes, he would give it to her, and let her see, that whatever 
she thought, other people at least could understand his merits. 
He handed it to her. She put on her spectacles and read it. 
After she had read it, she looked over the rim of her glasses 
with an amused expression, and said, “’Od, Tammas, he 


BLINDPITS. 


43 


thinks ye’re a hit laddie — and in a sense he’s no far wrang — 
an’ he advise ye to stick to yer trade. If ye had ta’en my 
advice to that effect mony a year sin’, it wad hae been tellin’ 
baith you and me ; hut it canna he helpit now. A gude loaf 
aye sells, hut metre ! — even if what the man says is true, what 
can ye mak o’t ? ” 

Mrs. Dods spoke resignedly. Insensibly she had been 
soothed by the verdict on her husband’s verses ; and she had 
been touched, as well as tickled, by the contrast between the 
supposed youth and her hus band sinking into old age. She 
continued, “ Weel, Tammas, if ye’re done wi’ yer denner, ye 
may lay Mr. Richardson’s cloth as lang as it’s licht, and it’ll 
be ready.” 


CHAPTER VI. 


On the morning when Mr. Pettigrew took in the large en- 
velope containing Mr. Dods’s promising family, he saw the 
postman step across the passage to Mrs. Barclay’s door, and if 
he had given way to his customary thirst for information, he 
would have followed him with the view of examining the 
Barclay letters ; hut he contented himself with merely turn- 
ing over in his mind all the probabilities respecting them. 
But he did not imagine the big stone that was that morning 
splashed into their usually quiet pool. 

The four ladies were seated at breakfast. They were not 
accustomed to a sheaf of letters every day. Indeed a single 
letter dropping in was the exception rather than the rule. 
When the servant entered, Miss Dobbie extended her hand 
for the letter ; but the girl passed, and laid it on the table be- 
side Miss Barclay, who was engaged making tea. 

“ Not for me ! ” said Miss Dobbie ; that is curious. I was 
expecting a note of invitation to Dobbiestanes for their party 
on Christmas evening. They always have a family party on 
Christmas evening. I have not been at it so regularly of 
late years as I used to be ; one year it was not convenient, 
another I had cold, and another they stupidly forgot to post 
my note in time ; but I think I’ll go this season. What do 
you think I should wear, Mrs. Barclay ? ” 

“ I’m so little in the world now,” said Mrs. Barclay, with a 
heavy sigh, “ that I can hardly give an opinion. Are you not 
going to read that letter, Barbara ? ” 

“Yes, mamma, immediately.” 


BLINDPITS. 


45 


“ I was thinking,” pursued Miss Dobbie, “ of a black lace 
shawl over my pearl-gray satin, with a green head-dress hav- 
ing a single pink moss-rose in the side ; that would be lady- 
like — not too elderly, do you think? — matronly enough, per- 
haps.” 

“ What is it, Barbara. You look as if it -were something 
more than usual.” 

“ It is from a Dr. MWicar.” 

“ Dr. MWicar ! who in the world is that ? ” 

“ The Queen’s private secretary most likely,” said Bessie. 
v Her Majesty will be wanting Aunt Bar. as governess to the 
royal children.” 

“ Have you any interest at court, Miss Barclay ? ” said Miss 
Dobbie; “ several of Miss Davie’s pupils were presented at 
court. I never was myself, but Mrs. Drank Dobbie was, upon 
her marriage, by the Countess of Whims. Governess to the 
royal children ! I should think that would be a good ap- 
pointment.” 

Bessie was speaking nonsense, Miss Dobbie ; you might 
know her by this time. Dr. MWicar, mother, is a medical 
man at Heatherburgh ; he writes to say that Miss Boston 
is ” 

“ Gone ? ” broke in Mrs. Barclay, excitedly. 

u Ho, mother ; but I’ll read what he says : — i Dear Madam 
— Though a stranger, I take the liberty of addressing you, to 
let you know that Miss Boston is suffering from severe influ- 
enza. She has no one with her but a servant, and I suggested 
the propriety of sending for some female friend. You may be 
aware that Miss Boston is a little peculiar, and at first she did 
not receive my suggestion with much favor ; but to-day she 
consented that I should write to you and ask you to come, so I 
trust that, if possible, you will not lose time in coming ; it will 
be a charity. — I am, dear madam, yours truly, 

JOHN MWICAR’ ” 

Mrs. Barclay was in a flutter, and would have hurried her 
daughter off on the instant, but Barbara declined such a 


46 


BLINDPITS. 


sudden exodus, and quietly remarked, “ she would go next day 
— a day couldn’t make much difference.” 

“ It may make all the difference. Miss Boston might take 
it as a slight, and alter her will ; hut you’re always so cool ; I 
daresay if the city were bombarded, you would look if your 
gloves needed mending before you tried to escape.” 

“ How long will you stay ? ” asked Miss Dobbie. 

“ Not longer than the holidays, if so long.” 

“ They’ll be dull here when we’re both away,” Miss Dobbie 
said. 

“ And, Barbara, you’ll see the Grants of course ; I’ve no 
doubt they visit often enough at Blindpits. If I were you I 
would show Mr. Grant you did not forget his shameful conduct 
to those that are gone ; for I blame him — I don’t blame Bar- 
bara Boston — there is no question he poisoned her ear.” 

“ If he did, it was disgraceful,” said Bessie warmly. 

“ You don’t know what you are talking about, Bessie,” said 
her aunt. 

Miss Barclay was far from being a fluttered unprotected 
female ; she could travel as judiciously as she could do every- 
thing else. A first-class ticket would have suited her tastes 
and leanings, a third-class her purse, so she compromised the 
matter and took second class. You will readily understand 
that the great heart of the universe did not beat in her suffi- 
ciently to make her enjoy the humors of third-class travelling ; 
in short, she shrank from chaff and slang. 

She took her place in an empty carriage ; Bessie stood be- 
side her, and they kept on having more last words. “ I think 
you are going to have the carriage to yourself, auntie; dignity 
is a dull thing, I would have taken third class.” 

“Now, Bessie, see that you keep things comfortable, and 
lon’t idle your time ; just go on with your lessons as usual.” 

“ I’ll work double tides, never fear, and I’ll get Mr. Dods to 
put a crust on a very big pasty that’ll nearly serve till you 
come back, then I’ll not be distracted about dinner.” 

“Bessie, I’m afraid of the foolish things you’ll do in my ab- 
sence.” 


BLINDPITS. 


47 


“ Don’t be afraid — oh ! positively — yes it is — Mr. Pettigrew 
coming along and looking for a seat ; you’ll get him to travel 
with, and it \till he such an ease to my mind.” 

Mr. Pettigrew having caught sight of Bessie, hurried up. 
“ How is Miss Betsy to-day ? ” he said ; u are you going by 
this train ? ” 

“ Who — I ? Ho, I’m not going certainly.” 

He spied Miss Barclay in her corner, and asked where she 
was going, and said, “ That’s the very place I’m going to ; 
you had better come out and take third class with me.” 

“ Thank you, I’ll do very well here.” 

“ If the thing is explained, you’ll get back the difference of 
the tickets when we come out.” 

“ Perhaps, but I’m quite comfortable ; I’ll just stay where 
I am, thank you.” 

" 1 think you’re wrong. I’ll have to take my seat, but 
you’ll know that I’m in the train.” 

*'* Thank you, I’ll keep that in mind.” 

u Auntie, your empire is shaking ; he didn’t think of get- 
ting a second-class ticket.” 

“ I’m thankful it didn’t occur to him ; it couldn’t occur to 
him — such an idea.” 

“ Then you’re off ; if you feel dull or eerie, remember he is 
in the train.” 

Mr. Pettigrew wondered at his own boldness in his brief in- 
terview with Miss Barclay. Like the cock, when on his own 
eminence he could be bold enough, but elsewhere he had two 
phases — either he was too forward or he w T as too backward. 
The falseness of his position, so far as he was able to take it 
in, probably aggravated these failings. Whether he was a 
holy man or not does not need to be here said ; certainly he 
did not exhibit the beauty of holiness, if there is such a thing 
as the ugliness of holiness, he possibly exemplified that. If 
he had got a church — and considering his voice it is a wonder 
he had not — he would have been different ; with an assured 
position his own assurance would have been better balanced^ 
However, he had not a church, and it was well — it was better 
than well. 


48 


BLINDPITS. 


At D he waylaid Miss Barclay, and found to his aston 

ishment that she was going farther, but to what precise place 
she did not inform him. People that knew Mr. Pettigrew 
had a wicked pleasure in not making him any wiser than they 
could help, and finally he went on his way. 

During the latter part of her journey Miss Barclay had one 
fellow-traveller, a man getting to middle age, of goodly size 
and well-favored countenance ; but Barbara did not amuse 
herself speculating on people with whom she had nothing to 
do ; she was aware of his presence, but little more. 

On his part, Mr. Goldie — that was his name — was struck 
with the sweet serene face opposite him. It was turned 
towards the window and away from him, and the profile was 
very good ; the eyes were fixed in reverie, and the lips were 
slightly apart, and there was a kind of wistfulness in the 
expression that interested him. He surveyed the trim figure 
and the well-appointed dress, and wondered where she wrnuld 
be going, and whether any one waited for her — it was a dark 
bleak night — and why that shade of sadness was in her face : 
her dress was not black. 

How, to tell the exact truth, Barbara had fallen into a 
brown study, first, in thinking over the contents of her purse, 
and coming to the conclusion that she had left a sixpence 
lying on the board when she took her ticket. It worried her 
to have lost sixpence in this way, it worried her much more 
than people with whom sixpences are plentiful could imagine ; 
she looked wistful about it. If her fellow-traveller could 
have guessed her thoughts, "would he have been amused ? for 
a little, perhaps, and then I think he would have been grieved. 
When sixpences come to be objects of serious consideration, it 
argues a grievous want of money; and a want of money 
brings a host of petty depressing cares, apt to bend or break 
even a noble spirit. 

Then she had thought of Blindpits and her old friend there, 
and that had brought up the past very vividly ; and there 
were many things in the past which she found it her best wis- 
dom to shut out of her thoughts — if she could. 


BLIXDPITS. 


49 


When the train stopped at the Heatherburgh station she 
rose to get out. 

“ Allow me,” said Mr. Goldie ; “ I go out here too ; ” and 
he stepped down and handed her out. He was inclined to ask 
if she went his way, and to offer her a drive, but he could not 
take that liberty. Ignorant of the kind thoughts expended 
on her, Barbara stood at the door of the station, and saw one 
vehicle after another receive its freight and move off, from the 
carriage-and-pair to the farm-cart, but no one asked for her ; 
she had hardly expected that she would be sent for ; it was so 
long since she had been an object of attention that it seemed 
quite natural she should be left to shift for herself. 

Out from the glow of light she stepped into what seemed 
by contrast pitchy darkness. There had been a heavy fall of 
snow some days before, and it was still lying, but a partial 
thaw had set in which surcharged the roads with a thick 
sloppy gravy, in which your feet slipped back nearly as fast as 
you put them forward. A man with a lantern passed her, 
but he walked so quickly that the light faded in the distance 
like a star of hope. The snow, however, mitigated the dark- 
ness. As she climbed the hill, she was fain to use her 
umbrella to aid her ; when she stood still to take breath, and 
looked back, she saw a young moon like half a silver ring 
lying trembling on the edge of the sea. Barbara was not 
imaginative ; leaving a glow of light and warmth and going 
into outer darkness had conjured up no thoughts in her to 
make her shudder, nor was she cheered by that pale young 
crescent glittering in the gloom as if it were a gleam from a 
door of heaven to lead her on. All she thought was that she 
was having an uncomfortable walk, and right glad was she 
when the friendly lights of Heatherburgh came in sight. 
She remarked, in passing, that this village was keeping pace 
with the times ; it had got side pavements, gas, and a new 
west end, so that she hardly knew it ; but very well she knew 
the half-mile of road betweeen it and Blindpits — it was 
unchanged. 

When she got to Miss Boston’s door, there was not a 
3 


50 


BLINDPITS. 


vestige of light about the house, and everything was still as 
the grave. But she remembered the kitchen was at the back, 
and so was Miss Boston’s bedroom, and reassured she pulled 
the bell. In about five minutes the door was opened by a big 
rustic lad in moleskins, with his hair all on end as if from 
fright; he held a candle high above his head and simply 
stared. 

“ Miss Boston, how is she ? ” said Barbara. 

The lad stood up against the door, and motioned her past 
him, “ Gang in, gang in,” said he ; “ she’s pittin’ on her 
gown.” 

She entered, and the youth marshalled her along the 
passage with the tramp of a horse, he thew open a door, and 
again said, “ Gang in, an’ I’ll tell her.” 

As Barbara went into the room a man jumped off the sofa. 
“ Is this ? — this is not ” — 

“ Miss Barclay,” said Barbara. 

“Ay, well I thought so. I’m Dr. M’Vicar. I’m glad 
you’re come. I was just taking a nap ; I was up all night, 
and a medical man sleeps when he can.” 

He had taken her hand and seated her on the sofa beside 
himself ; he still held her hand, and spoke confidentially as if 
to a friend of thirty years’ standing. 

“ How did you come, Miss Barclay ? ” 

“ By the railway, and walked from the station.” 

“ No ! Walked from the station in a night like this ? You 
are a heroine ! ” 

“ How is Miss Boston ? ” 

“ Better, I do think, better. It is an illness a young person 
would have got easily through ; but at her time of life, you 
know — at her time of life ” — 

“ Yes ; it is a very long time since I have seen her ; perhaps 
it would be as well if you would let her know that I am 
here.” 

“ Certainly — certainly. You will be a comfort to her ; at 
least you will be a great comfort to me. A good nurse, I 
always say, a good nurse is worth half a medical man. When 


BLINDPITS. 


51 


I’ve got a nurse for a patient that will carry out nay directions, 
then I’m at ease.” 

The doctor went upstairs. Barbara surveyed the room she 
was in. Poor as she was, her own home had an air of comfort 
that was wanting here ; — walls on which the paint had worn 
hare, old tables with a multitude of straight thin legs, old 
chairs and old sofa; a modern grate, guiltless of polish, 
however, but filled with a great reckless fire, a mountain of 
cinders and ashes on the hearth, and dust everywhere, it 
looked as if it had been lifted bodily out of a railway-station 
and set down in its present place. Two tall thin candles in 
silver candlesticks were burning on the middle table, that 
style of candle with solemn dreary wicks, whose merit is that 
they don’t need snuffing ; as if snuffing the candle was not an 
accomplishment and an amusement — really a resource during a 
long winter night in the country. Yet, undoubtedly, it was the 
same room she had been accustomed to as a child, with the 
additional wear and tear of years and no renewal ; and, after 
all, dreary as it looked, it was very much less changed than 
she was. 

A person she supposed to he Miss Boston’s servant came 
into the room and attacked the fire vigorously, probably to 
keep herself in countenance. 

“ You’ll be the Miss Barclay that the doctor tell’d me was 
cornin’. I was pittin’ on my gown when ye cam’ to the door, 
and the laddie had to open it.” 

“ Is Miss Boston able to he up ? ” 

“ Up ! she’s no’ been out o’ her bed for a fortnight. Puir 
body, she’s gey silly now.” 

The doctor returned, and said, "Bell, your mistress says 
you’re to get tea immediately for Miss Barclay, or whatever 
she would prefer.” 

" I may go up and see Miss Boston now, Doctor ? ” 

“ Certainly, and I’ll hid you good night. I’ve left a draught 
on the table, you’ll see ; you may give her it at ten o’clock ; it 
is to make her sleep ; and I’ll look in to-morrow forenoon.” 

Two dreary deadlight-looking candles were burning in Miss 


52 


BLINDPITS. 


Boston’s room too, and the same kind of fire as downstairs, 
but on a lesser scale. Miss Boston was propped up by pillows 
in bed, but her face was in the shade, and the ravages which 
time and illness had made were not distinctly visible. . 

She said, “ Is that you, Barbara ? 99 

“ Yes, Miss Boston,” and Babara stooped and kissed her. 

It was long — oh, how long ! — since lips had been pressed to 
that old face : then there was silence. If Miss Boston had 
spoken at that moment she must have sobbed ; and to betray 
emotion of that kind would have been to her proof that her 
mind was failing as well as her body. In a little she told her 
visitor to go downstairs and see if she could get anything to 
eat, and “ look after yersel’, Barbara ; for if Bell’s in ane o’ 
her pavees, she’ll not be ower gracious.” 

Barbara was very wearied, and she sat down to table faint 
but not appetised, and the tall sepulchral candles with the 
drooping wicks were not very cheerful company. So she fin- 
ished her meal in a few minutes, and finding that her patient 
had fallen asleep, she lay down on a sofa in her room and was 
soon asleep also. 

She was shortly roused by Miss Boston coughing, coughing 
as if she would choke, and Barbara sprang up ashamed of 
herself, and hastened to support her friend. 

“ Thank ye ! ” the old lady gasped as she was able. When 
she was laid back on the pillows, and had rested a little, 
Barbara said, “ That’s a terrible cough ; can the doctor do 
nothing for it ? ” 

“Do!” said Miss Boston; “he thinks he can do wonders, 
puir man, but it’s ill tinkerin’ an auld pan.” 

As if to confirm this observation, in spite of the doctor’s 
sleeping draught, his patient not only did not sleep, but 
coughed continuously. It was a marvel how she stood it ; and 
Barbara was up and down the whole night — not that she 
could do much beyond showing sympathy in any way that 
occurred to her. Miss Boston suffered much, and no position 
gave her ease, but she made no complaint ; only once, in an 
interval of coughing, Barbara heard her say, as if to herself, 


BLIXDPITS. 


53 


tc Oh, what is’t that glues us to this life ? ” It was a touching 
question. Miss Boston might shrink from death, as every- 
thing that has life is known to do, hut it does not follow that 
she was w 7 holly unprepared for it, although I have small doubt 
that people in the neighborhood, whose religion was of the 
fussy order, thought her little better than an old heathen, and 
I don’t mean to deny that she had her heathenish points, — 
most people have. 

The long December night came to an end in that room, as 
as well as in thousands of sick-rooms, the inmates of which 
had been saying, “ Would God it were morning ! ” and Bar- 
bara was shocked to see in the light of day the change on 
Miss Boston since she had known her. Then she was in hale 
middle life, and looked ten years younger than she w r as ; now 
her face was worn and anxious and pinched, her nose was more 
prominent than ever, her teeth were gone, and senile down 
was on her chin ; hut there was no senility in her mind — that 
was as clear and sound as ever, and neither had her sight nor 
hearing failed. She sat up in bed and ate a breakfast very 
tolerable for an invalid (old-fashioned constitutions had a w 7 orld 
of wear and tear in them), and then lay down and slept peace- 
fully for some hours. Barbara took advantage of this to write 
home. 

u Blindjjits, December 18, — 

“ My Dear Mother, — You will he happy to learn that I 
arrived here in perfect safety last evening. I cannot say that 
my journey was a pleasant one; but at this season of the 
year, and with the prospect of seeing an old and valued friend 
suffering from illness, it would have been unreasonable to 
expect much pleasure. Miss Boston has altered much in ap- 
pearance since I saw her last, which I ought not to have been 
surprised at, as it is the necessary consequence of the flight of 
time — it does not pass *over any of usr innocuously ; hut she is 
not so ill as I was led to expect, I am thankful to say. She 
had a had night owing to a severe cough, but if she could 
secure immunity from it, I sincerely trust she would not he 
long of being restored to a comparative measure of health. 


54 


BLIKDPITS. 


“ The medical man is an old, friendly, sensible gentleman, 
upon whom I would he disposed to place considerable reliance. 
I don’t think, from the little I have seen, that Miss Boston is 
very fortunate in her servant, which is the more to he regret- 
ted as she is so dependent on a servant. Bor Bessie’s infor- 
mation, I may say that I was alone half of the journey, and 
during the last half had the company of only one stout elderly 
gentleman.” 

(Mr. Goldie, by the way, had forgotten the face he had been 
taken with before he was ten yards from the station ; but it 
had come up to him in his dreams, and he had said to himself 
while dressing, ‘ It was a sweet face ; I am rarely mistaken in 
a face, and yon was one to be trusted.’ He did not see that 
face again for many months, and when he did see it, it was in 
circumstances so unexpected that even his faith in it was 
staggered.) 

“ Bessie will write very soon ; I hope she is keeping you 
comfortable. Give my love to Miss Bobbie, and believe me, 
my dear mother, ever your affectionate daughter, 

Barbary Barclay. 

“ JP.S . — The country here is covered with snow, and a ther- 
mometer outside Miss Boston’s window is down so low as 22°. 
The stars were uncommonly bright last night, or rather this 
morning, when I looked out between two and three.” 

“ That’s a most unsatisfactory letter — most unsatisfactory,” 
said Mrs. Barclay, when she had heard her granddaughter read 
it aloud ; “ but Barbara is always like herself.” 

“But is it not satisfactory to know that she arrived 
safely ? ” 

“ What was to prevent her doing that, I wonder ? ” 

“There might have been a railway accident,” suggested 
Miss Bobbie. • 

“But there was not,” Mrs. Barclay said testily; “ who cares 
what the medical man is ? and the idea of telling us about 
the thermometer ! She knows my anxiety, yet catch her say 
how she was received, or if she has found out the terms of the 
will.” 


BLINDPITS. 


55 


“ How could she know about the will, grandmamma, unless 
she asked the old lady point-blank, and she could hardly do 
that?” 

“ She'll take her own waj 7 -,” groaned Mrs. Barclay ; “ she’ll 
just come hack as wise as she went. If she doesn’t ask 
direct, Barbara Boston is not the woman to be pumped.” 

“ And very right,” said Miss Dobbie. “ Miss Davie, who 
was reckoned an uncommonly wise, prudent person, used to 
warn me ; she would say, ‘ Jane, my dear, there’s not much 
worldly wisdom in that pretty little head of yours, but you 
might learn not to say all you think to every one.’ And I 
have learned, Mrs. Barclay — I have learned — what poet is it 
that says , 1 Sharp are the uses of adversity ’ ? ” 

“ They are sharp enough in all conscience,” said Mrs. Bar- 
lay. “ Bessie, sit down and write to your aunt immediately, 
and we’ll hear the sooner from her again ; don’t say anything 
about me expecting information as to the will though, for that 
would be enough to prevent her ever mentioning it,” and Mrs. 
Barclay groaned. 

“And Bessie,” said Miss Dobbie, “you may tell her from 
me, that I have got my dress very nicely arranged for the 
Dobbiestanes party, and say that I hope she is enjoying her- 
self, and that her dear old friend is getting better, and that 
we expect the weather will soon be warmer, and that I hope 
they have good fires, but they always have in country-houses. 
I mind, Miss Davie once went with me to Dobbiestanes — it 
was after Frank was married — and she remarked to me, ‘ Jane, 
I hope your cousin won’t ruin himself in coals. I’ve heard of 
a man burning a hole in his pockets.’ She used to say such 
clever things, Miss Davie. She was a mother to me — all the 
mother I ever knew ; and say, that if you forget anything I 
mind it, and that ” 

“ Beally, Miss Dobbie, you must write yourself ; you have 
enough to fill a letter.” 

“ Ho, my dear ; I used to be a good correspondent, but I 
must have fallen off very much, for few people write to me 
now.” 


56 


BLINDPITS. 


According to her grandmamma’s wish Bessie wrote as 
fo llows : — 

Berwick St., Ironburgh, December 18 — . 

My right trusty and well-beloved Aunt Bar. — We got yours, 
and are glad to know of your safety and Miss Boston’s better- 
ness — that’s good English is it ? Miss Dobbie hasn’t got her 
Christmas invitation yet ; it will be a shame if it doesn’t 
come. We mind everything between us, I think, her and me. 
And now I’ll tell you a secret — and you mustn’t be angry. 
When I was at Mrs. Dods’ yesterday forenoon, Mr. Dods said 
if I liked he would take me to a reading in the evening — he 
and I have been speaking of readings, and concerts, and 
things. It began at eight, and would be over by half-past 
nine, and he would take me to the reserved seats ; but he 
asked me not to mention it, as Mrs. Dods thought anything of 
that kind a throwing away of money. So I didn’t mention it. 
I was very anxious to go, and we went, and I enjoyed it, that 
is, I didn’t enjoy it, for I never care for being read to ; but I 
enjoyed it because I thought I could have done it better myself. 
It was a lady who read — a lady in black satin and white gloves, 
with her hair done up to a pitch. Well, she read 1 Eugene 
Aram’s Dream,’ and the ‘ Haunted House,’ and I really felt I 
could have done it better. Mr. Dods said she had fine elocu- 
tion ; but if yon’s elocution, I would like less of it, and more 
feeling. The difficulty would be to read easily and well, and 
yet to let everybody hear ; but of course practice would do it. 
I was trying it this morning ; and though the doors were shut, 
and Katy was breaking up the gathering-coal, she heard me 
and came running to see what had happened. She got a 
fright when she saw me in my night-gown standing in bed and 
holding forth. You must think of it ; I’m sure I could do it — 
and teaching needs the patience of Job, which I have not. It 
seems funny to me how so many people turn out to hear things 
read to them that they could easily read to themselves ; but de 
gustibus non est, etc., as your friend the Rev. P. P. might say. 
I got Miss Dobbie to buy a front yesterday — her hair is so 
thin — and they are not so dear as I thought. But it is not 


BLINDP1TS. 


57 


the improvement I thought either — the thick glossy hair with 
the white regular division over the little withered rosy- apple- 
looking face. Well, it can’t he helped now, and I did it for 
the best. She says it will be so long before she can afford 
another that she must take great care of it, and she sits with 
a folded handkerchief tied over it to keep the division from 
dust, etc. I can’t help laughing, which is a shame. Grand- 
mamma is in her usual. The Eev. P. P. has not returned yet. 
Kate broke her wash-hand basin the day you left, and Grand- 
mamma has bought another, but so small that she will need to 
pare her face before using it. The seven golden candlesticks, 
next door, were as bright as ever yesterday. Dear aunt have 
I made many mistakes ? Please, don’t send this back cor- 
rected ; I know it would be for my good, but don’t, there’s a 


good auntie. — I am ever your own 


B. B.” 


CHAPTER VII. 


Dr. M’Vicar was a physician of the old school. He had 
very considerable private means, was neat and punctilious in 
dress and equipage, and, above all, believed in medicine — be- 
lieved in doses so fearfully nauseous, that I daresay the like of 
them were never compounded outside a witch’s cauldron. He 
had been bred when the llhcet was in its glory, had seen the 
blood of his patients spurt to the roof, which it is said the 
blood of the patients won’t do in these degenerate days ; and 
he bled in inflammation still, let the new school say as it liked. 
Still no patient, gasping for health and trespassing after 
strange medical gods, ever mentioned a theory or mode of 
treatment to the doctor that he was not thoroughly familiar 
with and patted patronisiugly on the hack ; he was open to 
conviction, took the grains of truth that lurked even in foolish 
and erroneous systems, smoothed his patient’s doubts as to his 
own infallibility, and left him ashamed that he had ever pre- 
sumed to doubt it, and convinced that if it was in human 
power to save him, Dr. M’Vicar was the man to do it. 

This with the ordinary class of his patients, hut Miss Bos- 
ton was not of the ordinary class. He had known her for 
many years, hut she had never been his patient before, and she 
had not sent for him now ; he had called accidentally when she 
had begun to think of sending for him, hut she did not tell 
him that. She had small faith in doctors, only when people 
are very ill what can they do hut send for one ? However, she 
argued, he was an old man, and had seen a great deal of dis- 
ease, and must know something about it if he had ordinary 
sense and observation. 


BLINDPITS. 


59 


When Dr. M’Vicar went home from Blindpits, and had got 
into his slippers and easy chair, he told his family that the 
person Miss Boston sent for by his advice had arrived. 

“ Indeed,” said Mrs. Gascoigne, the Doctor’s sister ; “ sha 
has not been long.” 

“ I’m glad of it,” said Mary, the only child of the house ; 
“ T. always pity an old person left to the care of a sei vant.” 

“ It’s Miss Boston’s own blame,” said Mrs. Gascoigne ; 
“ often and often I’ve advised her to get a companion ; many a 
poor lady would he glad of the situation ; hut she’s a positive 
old body, and will only do as she likes.” 

“ The poor lady would have a precious time of it,” said 
Mary. 

“What sort of person is this, Doctor, that she has got at 
last ? ” 

“ Sensible, I think ; she'comprehended my directions readily 
enough; under the middle size rather, and greasy-looking, 
something like a gentleman’s housekeeper, or the matron of a 
hospital perhaps.” 

“ Is she a housekeeper or a matron ? ” 

“ No ; I don’t suppose it, hut she may he ; her mother is a 
cousin of Miss Boston’s and also of the Grants.” 

“ The Grants ! I never heard them mention a cousin of that 
name.” 

“Ho; people are not in the habit of speaking of cousins 
who keep mangles or something of that sort.” 

“ Keeps a mangle ! ” said Mrs. Gascoigne ; “ no wonder that 
she arrived in a hurry ; she’ll set herself to cook the old lady 
and cut the Grants out, who knows.” 

“ The Grants won’t care, I am sure,” said Mary. 

“ Won’t they ? ” said Mrs. Gascoigne. 

“ I hope so,” said the doctor ; “ for they’ll have me to blame 
for sending for this Miss Barclay ; but if she does get a thou- 
sand or two she’ll he the better for it, and they won’t miss it 
much.” 

“ I hope, Doctor, you mayn’t live to repent the plan ; it may 
he benevolent, hut it’s what I call rash,” said his sister. 

“ People never regret benevolence, aunt.” 


GO 


BLINDPITS. 


“If Mary doesn’t regret my benevolence, I’m sure I 
needn’t.” 

“ Papa ! ” cried Mary. 

“Your papa is quite right, Mary; John Grant is not the 
man to relish an inheritance being unnecessarily divided.” 

“ Papa and you never do justice to J ohn Grant,” and Mary 
left the room. 

“ Love is blind, you know, Robina,” said the doctor. 

“ It never made me blind, John.” 

“ I can believe it, Robin a.” 

“ But if people choose to shut their eyes, that’s a different 
thing.” 

“ It comes to the same thing if they can manage to keep 
them shut ; but the mischief is, they can’t do that.” 

“ They can affect to do it though. I’ve known women do 
that who saw as well as I do.” 

“ John may be a little fond of money,” said the doctor 
musingly, “ but I don’t think he will be a bad husband.” 

“ Certainly not,” said the widow ; “ he will be a very good 
husband, don’t fear.” 

Mrs. Gascoigne, — who walked in all w r eatliers, — and Mary 
M’ Vicar, put on their goloshes next forenoon and proceeded 
through the snow to Blindpits to ask for Miss Boston, the 
doctor’s sister intending to encourage, and advise, and gener- 
ally patronize Miss Barclay, if on sight she should be thought 
worthy of such encouragement and patronage. With the 
creak of the supposed mangle in their ears, the ladies were 
somewhat taken aback when Miss Barclay made her appear- 
ance. The doctor and his sister had a sliding scale of man- 
ners adapted to all ranks and classes, and Mrs. Gascoigne, 
having arranged her programme to suit an intelligent member 
of what she called the “lower orders,” was not prepared to 
meet Miss Barclay as an equal. Barbara’s manner, though 
stiff and roundabout to strangers, was perfectly self-possessed, 
so that when her visitor found her not overwhelmed by the oc- 
casion, and had investigated a brooch she wore and determined 
it wfts 4 thing of price, the old fashion of which pointed back 


BLINDPITS. 


61 


to one or two ancestresses, she concluded it would hardly do to 
question her in a confidential way as to her mother’s means 
and her own prospects. 

“ And you live in Ironburgli ? 99 said Mrs. Gascoigne, after 
the introduction and Miss Boston’s health had been got over. 

“ Yes, I live in Ironburgh.” 

“ I know a little of it myself. I have various friends who 
live in the west end of Ironburgh. What part of the town do 
you stay in — what street ? ” 

“ Berwick Street,” said Barbara promptly. 

" I don’t know that street — probably a new one ; I am told 
Ironburgh increases very rapidly.” 

“ Yes, it does ; but Berwick Street is at least thirty years 
old, I should think.” 

“ I thought it might be one of the new streets in the west 
end,” said Mrs. Gascoigne. 

“ Ho, it is in the east end,” said Barbara boldty. 

“ The country must appear very bleak to you accustomed to 
to the town in winter,” said Mary M’ Vicar, anxious to stop 
her aunt’s soundings, u and very cold.” 

11 Yes, I have found it cold ; a house standing alone is so 
different from our small flat in Berwick Street.” 

Mrs. Gascoigne was thrown out. How an individual of 
Miss Barclay’s appearance and manners should voluntarily 
and promptly, and with no apparent end in view, confess that 
she lived, moved, and had her being in a small flat in the east 
end of Ironburgh, puzzled her. 

Mrs. Gascoigne may have had her wrestling-matches with 
poverty ; she may have lived in the haunts of the plebs ; there 
may have been such damaging facts in her history; and it 
may be true that at that moment her annual income was nil, 
save as it came out of her brother’s pocket ; but all these facts 
were kept in rigorous imprisonment. Even her niece did not 
know these little things ; but then she had not been much 
beside her till of late. She only knew her as the Aunt 
Gascoigne to whom every one who had the privilege of her 
acquaintance ran for advice and sympathy ; who never went a 


62 


BLINDPITS. 


voyage in which the chief passengers in the vessel did not try 
to grapple her to their party with hooks of steel, or pay a 
visit to a family in which she did not become the prop of the 
old and the idol of the young members of it, and in which all, 
young and old, did not exhibit intense anxiety to win her con- 
sent to remain en permanence. That was a deeply-affecting 
chapter of her history, too, in which she lost her young hus- 
band in the first year of their marriage, which always con- 
cluded with the declaration that all the principal people of 
the neighborhood, including some gentlemen of title, attended 
the funeral, and condoled personally, or by note, with the 
young widow. Mary M’Vicar never understood how this 
consoled her aunt. 

“ And, my dear, I have never been able to think of marry- 
ing again — never.” 

Mary could sympathize with that tribute to tbe memory of 
her deceased uncle, although she never thought of that young 
hero as an elderly uncle. A lieutenant he had been in an 
infantry regiment, whose portrait, smiling in the heydey of 
youth, she had wept over. He was far nearer her than ho 
w r as near the woman he had married a score of years ago, — 
who had been tossed about the world since, fighting for her 
own hand, till on the death of his wife her brother asked her 
to come to him. When there was no one present she could 
look at that portrait without a tear or a sigh. When there’s 
no one by, what is the use of letting our feelings get the bet- 
ter of us ? It only tends to wrinkles and a grim expression. 
But she was not a heartless woman either. 

“Yes,” said Mrs. Gascoigne, “you’ll feel it cold here; I 
do. I often think of going to Florence or Naples for the 
spring months ; I have old friends in both places who would 
only be too glad to have me, but I can’t think of leaving my 
brother and Mary here ; but you’ll not be long of getting 
accustomed to the cold, and you’ll find it bracing.” 

“My stay will be so short that I’ll hardly get accustomed 
to it, but I don’t feel it very much.” 

“Oh, we were in hopes you had come to stay a long time,” 
said Mrs. Gascoigne. 


BLTNDP1TS. 


63 


u If I were to consult my own inclination I would stay, but 
I have engagements tliat make it imperative I should go 
kome in a fortnight.” 

“ What will become of poor Miss Boston ? ” said Mary. 

“ I have great hopes she will^e in her usual by that time, 
and not require me.” 

“ It must be dismal work staying with her,” said Mrs. Gas- 
coigne ; “ I don’t think I could do it for all her money twice 
told, but I like to know that she is looked after.” 

Barbara colored. “Miss Boston is a very old friend of 
mine ; it gives me great pleasure to be of service to her, but 
I have no doubt she would get a very good nurse for ten shil- 
lings a-week.” 

“ I’ve said that scores of times — scores of times,” repeated 
Mrs. Gascoigne, with energy ; “ many a respectable lady even 
would be glad of such a situation ; and I advise you, Miss 
Barclay, not to wear out your health and spirits by continuing 
such a strain upon them.” 

“ I would never think of myself ; if it were in my power to 
stay, I would be only too glad,” said Barbara, simply. 

“ You are very good,” said Mrs. Gascoigne, unable to sup- 
press a slight emphasis on her words, and rising to leave. As 
Mary M’ Vicar shook hands with Barbara, she said, “ Do come 
to us any time you feel dull, I shall be so glad to see you.” 

“ Mary, my dear,” said her aunt, when they were outside 
Miss Boston’s gate, “ I think it would be as well to wait till 
you know more about people before you issue invitations.” 

“ Why ? We see that Miss Barclay is a lady, and we know 
she’s a cousin of the Grants, and I waited till I saw whether 
you would do it.” 

“ But, my dear, you might know that when I do a thing, or 
when I don’t do it, I have reasons. Miss Barclay may be, I 
don’t* doubt is, a very excellent, respectable person, but it is 
quite time enough yet to ask her to our house. Who is 
that ? ” she asked, as she lifted up her eyes and beheld a man 
on horseback approaching. 

“ It’s old Mr. Grant, aunt.” 


64 


ELINDPITS. 


“ Old Mr. Grant, indeed!” said Mrs. Gascoigne, “Why, 
how old do you take him to be ? Very little more than forty, 
if so much, and I don’t call that old.” 

“ Well, well ; it distinguishes him from his son. I call him 
young Mr. Grant.” ^ 

When Mr. Grant was near enough to see who the ladies 
were, he got off his horse to speak to them ; and certainly, 
standing there among the snow like a colossus of health and 
strength, the adjective old did not seem very descriptive of 
him. Mrs. Gascoigne — and she may he presumed to he a 
judge — called Mr. Grant a gentleman ; her brother called 
him a fine fellow ; Lord Heatherdale had been heard to say 
he did not know what he should do without Grant ; and Miss 
Boston — Miss Boston whose opinion might be worth much — 
allowed that there were worse people in the world than J ames 
Grant. Mary M’Vicar liked him well ; and there were not 
wanting ladies in the district who thought his high forehead, 
keen grey eyes, and aquiline nose — in short, his whole face 
and person — quite a type, of manly beauty. As for age, Mr. 
Grant was younger than his own son. Young Mr. Grant 
knew most things, and was very seldom astonished ; now Mr. 
Grant senior could go to see a panorama and come away 
delighted, thinking it the finest sight possible, and innocent 
enough to say so. If, as is likely, there were sharp business 
men — men of affairs — among the Greeks and Trojans, as dis- 
tinguished from the warriors, pure and simple, then Mr. Grant 
senior was a lingering type of these men. He was Homeric 
in his healthy, breezy freshness, mingled with a dash of 
Laertes’ son for wiles renowned. 

“ And you’ve been at Blindpits ? How is Miss Boston to- 
day?” 

Mrs. Gascoigne shook her head, then said briskly, “ Do you 
know, Mr. Grant, there’s a Miss Barclay there — a Miss* Bar- 
clay from Ironburgh. The doctor says she’s a cousin of 
yours ; do you know anything of her ? ” 

“ Hot a cousin of mine. Her mother was a cousin of Mrs. 
Grant’s. Ho ; I don’t know her. She had several brothers ; 
I knew them pretty well, but they are dead years ago.” 


BLLN’DPITS. 


65 


“Well ; you’ll find her there if you mean to call. She says 
she is not going to stay long, hut we’ll see,” said Mrs. Gas- 
coigne, significantly. 

“But,” said Mary, “she says she’s an old friend of Miss 
Boston’s, and I can fancy her paying a visit from pure kind- 
ness, without thinking of money.” 

“ To he sure, Mary, so can we all ; hut your aunt likes to 
look very knowing sometimes. Isn’t that true, Mrs. Gas- 
coigne ? ” 

“People are not always aware of their own weakness, Mr. 
Qrant. I suppose you are on your way to Blindpits ? ” 

“ Yes. You know I am an old friend of Miss Boston’s, 
too, and I like to have a talk with her.” 

“ You’ll not likely see her to-day, however ; hut there’ll he 
no harm in calling.” 

“ Harm ? I hope not, Mrs. Gascoigne. One never can go 
far wrong in paying a little attention to a fellow-creature 
especially in distress,” and he passed on smiling. 

Miss Boston’s single male inmate seemed endowed with a 
kind of instinct respecting the senior Mr. Grant’s visits to 
Blindpits, for Jie was always on the spot without an instant’s 
delay, to hold his horse, or take it to the stable as directed. 
The explanation was, he drew what was to him a large annual 
revenue in shillings and sixpences from Mr. Grant. Mr. Grant, 
in point of age, had twenty-one years the advantage of his 
son; hut, as I have hinted already, the young head' stood on 
his shoulders, and the old on the shoulders of his offspring. 
When Mr. Grant junior arrived at Blindpits, he had to whistle 
and knock and halloo, and often did all three in vain so far as 
attendance went ; for even Miss Boston, aware of the huhhub, 
would connive with her rustic hobbledehoy, and let the gen- 
tleman look after his horse himself, — and chuckle over it. He 
was not given to rash generosity : he paid all his legal debts 
punctually ; and where a largess was boldly claimed die had 
been known to give it, but whenever he could legally save a 
sixpence in a quiet way, that sixpence he saved. 

Miss Boston awoke — awoke from her long tranquil sleep, 


66 


BLINDPITS. 


with a pang, I shouldn’t wonder — to find herself once more 
horn into a world which to her was bleak and dreary. But 
weak as she was in body, she clutched her strength of mind 
to her. When told that Mr. Grant was in the house, she 
said, 

“ Barbara, gang down and fell him I’m a heap better ; he’ll 
be glad to hear it. But say I canna see him the day, I’m no 
able to see ony body yet.” 

Barbara had never seen Mr. Grant. He had come to this 
part of the country after her visits to it had ceased ; but as 
she entered the room where he was, she remembered that this 
was the man her brothers had pestered, and her mother had 
begged from, and as she walked up to him, ^wounded pride 
dyed her face with blushes. Possibly he guessed her thoughts. 
He looked at her as she gave him Miss Boston’s message and 
said to himself, “Poor thing, she must have had a hard 
struggle, and with such a mother too, and she has not sunk 
but floated. What a shame ! I never asked if I could help 
her.” He felt as if he should have blushed also, but though 
sins of omission may be as heinous as sins of commission, 
people don’t so readily blush for them. 

“ And you think Miss Boston is really better. I’m truly 
glad to hear it. The sight of you must have worked like a 
charm. I hope you will stay as long as possible with her.” 

“ Yes,” she said, shortly, and she did not ask him to sit 
down, nor did she take a seat herself. She had not allowed 
herself to be run away with b^ what she considered her 
mother’s prejudiced opinions ; but evidently Mr. Grant was a 
familiar friend of Miss Boston’s. His late wife, whom she 
remembered well — she was a very frequent visitor in her 
father’s house before the evil days came — his late wife and her 
own mother were Miss Boston’s nearest, if not only, relatives. 
Could her mother’s opinion be the correct one, and was he try- 
ing to grasp the whole inheritance ? If so, then, poor as she 
was, Barbara felt that she could afford to despise him — to 
despise him thoroughly. But then Mr. Grant looked very far 
from despicable. The expression of his good-looking face was 


BLINDPITS. 


67 


anything hut that of a man who would do the meanest of all 
mean actions — take advantage of a fellow creature’s weakness 
for his own ends — and his manner was kind and cordial ; hut 
many wolves range the earth in sheep’s clothing. 

“It’s a long time since you have been in this part of the 
country, I believe,” said he. 

“ A very long time, indeed,” replied Barbara. 

“ It will he almost strange to you then. You must come to 
Grantsburn some day. My sister will drive over for you.” 

“ Thank you ; I don’t mean to visit while I am here.” 

“ Oh, we’ll see about that,” and Mr. Grant went away. 

Barbara went to the window and watched him ride off. She 
was rather ashamed of herself on reflection. “After all,” 
thought she, “ he may as well accuse me of coming here for 
my own ends, as I him. I wonder if I’m beginning to lust 
after money. I will put Miss Boston’s money, at least, out of 
my mind altogether — imagine she is a poor body : it won’t 
he difficult to do in this house,” and she looked round the 
room, turned from the window, and sighed, a very unusual 
manifestation of feeling for her : her mother took that depart- 
ment, and needed no assistance. 

The servant chanced to come into the room, and Barbara 
said to her, “Does Miss Boston not like her grates kept 
brighter, Bell ? ” 

“ Ye may say that, mem : the hale house wad need paperin’ 
an’ pentin’ to mak’ it look decent, hut she’ll no hear tell o’t ; 
ony kind o’ cleanin’ just puts her in a frenzy.” 

“ Indeed ! she must he greatly changed ; everything used to 
he clean and nice.” 

“ Weel, I couldna say; this is only my third half-year.” 

“ As Miss Boston is upstairs, it can hardly disturb her to 
clean that grate ; it is like a grate in a roadside public-house. 
Get it polished a little, if you please.” 

“ Weel, weel,” muttered Bell. “ I wonder how long that 
woman’s gaun to hide,” she said to her fellow-servant in the 
kitchen, “ interfering wd’ things ; if she’s to hide lang I’ll not 
hide lang — twa mistresses is rather ower muckle o’ a guid 
thing.” 


68 


BLINDPITS. 


“ Weel, ye’ll see how ye’ll like twa mistresses; ye dinna 
thinks it’s ower mony for me.” 

“ Twice twa wadna he ower mony for you, if they could put 
mettle in yer heels ; my man, ye’ll gang a gey twa-three 
places or ye get a better ane than this, naething ado hut sit at 
the lug o’ the fire an’ tak yer meat.” 

11 An’ I’m thinking it’s no ilka place either that ye’ll get in 
Geordie Bogle maist ilka night, and get ham an’ eggs fried to 
his supper.” 

“ Geordie Bogle ! Ham an’ eggs ! ” said Bell, in rapt sur- 
prise ; “ the laddie’s in a creel.” 

u Ay, hut neither my lugs nor my nose is in a creel. I ken- 
ned I wasna fleeched awa’ to my bed at eight o’clock for neath- 
ing. An’ there’s no a hen layin’ — nae wonder an egg couldna 
he gotten for the leddy’s breakfast.” 

“ Ye young limb, do ye mean to insinuate that I tak the 
eggs?” 

“ Ho, I dinna. I ken ye tak them, and them twentypence 
the dizen the now too.” 

“ Davie, my man, it’s a pity but yer feet was as smart as 
yer fancy. Geordie Bogle cam in wi’ a letter the ither night 
he had gotten at the post, and the mistress wanted an egg an’ 
a morsel o’ ham that night I mind. Ye had better tak’ care 
how ye raise stories — I’ve kenned folk purten in the jail for 
less.” Davie was staggered by the explanation and the im- 
plied threat, but he was far from convinced. 


CHAPTER VIII. 


The people of the district had settled Miss Boston’s speedy 
demise as a certain event — it is so easy for the general public 
to make up its mind to a thing of that kind — and Dr. M’ Vicar 
had shaken his head repeatedly and said, “ At her time of life, 
you know, at her time of life.” 

But the point on which the public centred its interest was, 
How was her money left ? Some people, w'hose words were 
sharper than their thoughts were original, remarked that it 
wouldn’t be left at all if she could take it with her ; but this 
view of the case was not enlarged on, as it could serve no 
practical end — she couldn’t take it with her. To whom would 
it be left then ? If this Miss Barclay, it was said, had arrived 
in time she might have made a good thing of it ; but it was 
hardly likely the old lady 'would alter her will now. Would 
Mr. Grant get it all ? When asked that question, Mr. Grant 
only smiled, and said that he knew nothing about it ; but that 
was supposed by many to be a subterfuge, — his smile and his 
words contradicted each other. 

Would it go to an hospital, or be divided among public 
charities, or be left to build a church to be called the Boston 
Church — a scheme which has been many times hit upon as 
combining an earthly memory with a heavenly deed ? > 

It was not written that the public mind was to be set at 
rest on these points at this time, for, contrary to all expecta- 
tion, Miss Boston recovered rapidly. First, she sat up in bed, 
then she got out of bed and sat by her chamber-fire, next she 
went downstairs in the afternoon, and finally she arrived to 


70 


BLINDPITS. 


join Barbara at breakfast. It would have been better if she 
bad taken these steps more gradually, but sbe belonged to an 
old-fashioned, non-indulgent generation, and would not lie in 
bed if able to crawl out of ^it. 

Although she had always been accustomed to depend 
entirely on herself, and would not suffer herself to suppose she 
needed help, she enjoyed Barbara’s kindly ministrations, quick 
comprehension of the mysteries of her toilet, and deft assis- 
tance. When the awakwardness of drawing together again 
after so long an interval, w T as over, they got on very well. 

u I can do wi’ you, Barbara,” Miss Boston said. “ I can do 
fine wi’ you — that Mrs. Gascoigne has deaved me on the 
deafest side o’ my head to get what she ca’s a companion, as if 
I was gaun to put up wi’ ony stranger stappit in on me. bTa, 
na, there’s nae forlorn creature cornin’ here, because she can 
do nae better, to put up wi’ my humors, an mak’ me vexed 
every time I spoke aboon my breath, although I’m no sae able 
to do that as I have been.” 

“ Would it not be possible, Miss Boston, to get a better ser- 
vant ? I doubt Bell’s is only eye-service.” 

u Eye-service ! ” said Miss Boston, her voice rising, “ it’s no 
that length. I can see dirt weel aneuch, but I’m no able to 
contend wi’ her.” 

“ But surely there’s no need of contending ; a woman 
might be got who would do her work quietly and comfor- 
tably.” 

(i Maybe. I had ane that was wi’ me fifteen years, and sh e 
wad hae been here yet if she hadna ta’en’t into her head, like 
a gowk, to marry a common working man wi’ seven sons.” 

“ Most extraordinary — the woman must have been crazy,” 
said Barbara, who had a judicious horror of a woman landing 
herself in a conjugal mess. 

“ Ye may say sae ; an’ I tell’d her if she liket to bide I wad 
never see her at a loss ; but ye see, even servant women, it 
seems, canna live on bread and butter its lane ; she’s maybe 
rued it whiles, but she’s done a duty by the man an’ his 
bairns — that callant Davie is the second o’ them I’ve had. 


BLINDPITS. 


71 


I like to tak’ a mnckle hungry laddie for twa-three year an 
fill him up wi’ gude meat ; he’ll he mair a man a’ his days 
forT. It’s maybe a humble line o’ usefulness, hut I’m equal 
till’t, which I canna say o’ a’ the women’s wark I hear about 
now-a-days. Weel, since Davie’s stepmother was bewitched, 
I liavena fa’en in wi’ her marrow, an’ I’m sure I hate 
changes.” 

“ They are not pleasant, certainly.” 

a And do ye no think the house might be improved — new 
windows built out, an’ hae’t a’ papered and painted ? Mrs. 
Gascoigne says I should do that.” 

u There’s a good deal of discomfort connected with building, 
unless you could leave the house for a time, which you might 
not care for doing ; but I think if you were to paper and paint 
the rooms you use they would look more cheerful, and it would 
not cost much,” Barbara said, naturally ; for cost was always 
her first consideration in any little improvement she planned 
at home. 

“ Cost ! ” said Miss Boston, “ it’s no the cost I mind ; but 
what does it signify whether a body steps out o’ a glaur dub, 
or off a marble stane, into the next warld ? ” 

Barbara, who was not quick in her ideas, was meditating 
her answer to Miss Boston’s very peculiar language, as she 
considered it, when Bell came in to lay the cloth for dinner, 
and her mistress followed her nimble movements constantly 
with her eyes. 

“ Bell,” she said, suddenly, “ I heard a hen laying the day 
before I came down the stair.” 

“ They’re maybe gaun to begin now,” said Bell. 

“ They never gi’ed ower a’thegither,” said Miss Boston. 

“ Then what cam’ o’ the eggs, mem ? ” 

“ Ay, what cam’ o’ them, say ye ? ” 

“ Miss Boston ! ye dinna mean to say that I made away wi’ 
the eggs ? ” 

“ Whatever I meant, I asked what cam’ o’ them ; ye needna 
threep to me that there were nane laid,” said Miss Boston, 
the paternal temper glowing from its embers once more, flush- 


72 


BLINDPITS. 


ing her thin face, and elevating her treble tones ; “ an’ ye’ll 
see that there’s eggs, or an egg, forthcomin’ the morn’s morn- 
ing at your peril.” 

“ At my peril ! my certy, what peril will I be in, I wad like 
to ken?” 

“ I’ll hae ye ta’en up for a thief, ye brazen-faced hizzy that 
ye are,” and Miss Boston nearly squealed in her rising excite- 
ment. 

“ Oh, stop, Miss Boston ! ” cried Barbara, shocked at the 
scene ; “ it is possible enough the hens may not have been 

laying.” 

“ But it’s no possible,” cried Miss Boston, as if she was 
shouting to a deaf person, “ as many hens fed as they are, or 
ought to be, and in a w r arm house ; it’s no possible, and it 
never happened before.” 

Bell had left the room, and she came back with an egg in 
her hand, and going up to Miss Boston, said, “ There’s yer 
egg, mem, an’ I wad advise ye to tak’ care o’t ; where could 
ye put it to be safest, do ye think ? ” Instantaneously the 
egg was dashed in the woman’s face, and she turned and ran 
to the kitchen smarting under the sudden blow. 

Barbara said nothing, but Miss Boston rose and said, 
“ We’ll have dinner now.” It was on the table, and they took 
llieir places. Miss Boston said, “Will you ask a blessing, 
Barbara ? ” Barbara went through a form, but all her sense 
of propriety was so outraged that she hardly knew what she 
said, and not another word was spoken during the meal, nor 
was the scene alluded to by either afterwards. Ho doubt Miss 
Boston was ashamed of it, and she suffered for it in the flesh 
also, for she was sensibly the worse of the agitation. 

In the afternoon, to the relief of both ladies, two old friends 
of Miss Boston’s called — Misses Stark from Heatherburgh. 
Their appearance belied their name, for they were little frail- 
looking creatures, dressed in mourning which appeared to have 
been all in the dyer’s vat since it was new, but they carried 
themselves with some dignity. 

Hone of Miss Boston’s friends could be accused of con- 


.BLINDPITS. 


sciously toadying lier ? but it is to be presumed that had she 
been in a dependent position, or even if she bad existed on a 
slender annuity, the charms of her society would hardly have 
sufficed to bring the people about her that were in the habit 
of visiting at Blindpits. Even unconsciously they toadied her 
very little, considering she was a solitary woman undoubtedly 
wealthy, and it is a pleasant fact to have to record. Still Dr. 
M’ Vicar patiently overlooked her outspoken opinions regarding 
himself and his profession, and was very attentive ; and his 
sister, Mrs. Gascoigne, who declared she “ enjoyed character” 
so much, would hardly have scaled a stair to behold it devel- 
oped on the pauper’s allowance of two shillings a-week. Even 
Mr. Grant, it is to be feared, might have forgotten the fact 
that Miss Boston was his deceased wife’s cousin ; it is quite 
certain his son would ; but Mary M’ Vicar would have looked 
in on the poor old woman sometimes with a dainty offering in 
her hand. 

The Misses Stark mixed only with the best society of the 
place, and they had long had the entry of Blindpits, and not 
every one had that. Miss Boston had satisfaction in saying 
that there were people in the district who had never been 
within her door and never would, saying it in a way that im- 
plied she knew their anxiety to be on visiting terms with her. 
The Misses Stark, not having much to do at home, often 
stayed for weeks at Blindpits, and they had put up with much, 
with much which they might not have overlooked had their 
hostess been as poor as themselves ; but even they did not act 
from interested motives altogether, they had not the energy to 
plan and carry out a sustained attack on Miss Boston’s money. 
If either of them had possessed the ability to take Miss Bos- 
ton and her concerns in hand, that lady would probably have 
submitted, in consideration that she was approaching the time 
when the grasshopper becomes a burden ; but they were feeble, 
and Miss Boston despised feebleness in all its branches ; it set 
her on edge, and not the less so that she had begun to experi- 
ence it in her own person. But the Misses Stark were good 
4 


74 


BLINDPITS. 


little women, and she had a regard for them, and in her turn 
“enjoyed character” in them. 

They sat all the afternoon and evening, and buzzed on like 
bees, sometimes in concert and sometimes separately. Miss 
Jane being engaged on one side of the table giving Miss Bos- 
ton what news she had been able to muster, Miss Ann de- 
voted herself to Barbara on the other side, and gave her a de- . 
tail of all the more outstanding illnesses that had been in the 
Stark family, since it had been a family, down to her own last 
attack of bronchitis. Barbara listened attentively ; it did not 
occur to her to feel bored — was it not the kind of lore with 
which her own memory was furnished ? 

But the Misses Stark set themselves to do good after their 
ability ; virtue did not go out of them, which is surely the 
very highest style of doing good, as well as the most telling, 
hut it was jerked out of them according to their lights. Miss 
Jane, who had a shade more vis than her sister, had blown 
many little sermons to Miss Boston by a side-wind ; for a 
measure of pawkiness is not inconsistent either with feebleness 
or virtue — at least they are to he found side by side often 
enough. To-night, having an end in view, she chose for her 
text the responsibility connected with money. 

“ I think,” she said, “ rich people should use their money 
according to their station, not abusing it ; and give the surplus 
to charitable and benevolent purposes.” 

“ I’m o’ your mind there, J ean,” said Miss Boston ; “ it’s a 
stupid thing hoarding siller just to set a pack o’ greedy folk 
quarrelling ower it afore you’re weel cauld in yer grave, hut 
rich folk canna whiles see that.” 

“It is surprising,” said Ann; “if I were rich, oh what a 
luxury it would he to me to give — to give largely, freely.” 

“ Ay,” said Miss Boston, “ it’s a luxury that the likes o’ us 
puir bodies whiles crave after; hut rich folk hae so many 
luxuries that this ane jinks out o’ sight amang them gey -an’ 
aften.” 

“ They are the more to he pitied,” said Miss Jane ; “ it 


BLINDPITS. 


75 


often consoles me in my poverty that I haven’t the tremendous 
responsibility of riches on my shoulders.” 

“ It’s a mercy, Jean, that nane o’ us need lie waken at 
night, thinking what we should do wi’ our hoards.” 

“Oh,” said Miss Jane, “it is not that I would be at any 
loss what to do with money, if I had it. I would make con- 
science of apportioning my income, so much to live on, so 
much for future provision, and the rest to be spent for the 
good of my fellow-creatures. I think I could manage it, 
nicely, in some such way as that.” 

“ Then, if ony body were to leave ye a fortune, Jean, ye 
wadna get sic a gliff after a’.” 

“ It would be my earnest endeavor to make a good use of 
it ; and, by the way, Ann and I are collecting for a very 
excellent object just now. If I had plenty of money, I would 
give to it pretty liberally. You’ll give us a subscription I’m 
sure, Miss Boston. We have never applied to you in vain 
yet.” 

“ I’ll see. What is’t ye’re collecting for ? You’ll hae your 
book ? ” 

Miss Ann produced her collecting-book, and Miss Boston 
put on her spectacles and read, “Subscription towards the 
support of a Header for the Ignorant Men’s Association Meet- 
ings.” “ A reader ! What’s that ? ” asked she. 

“A person to read to them — to read aloud, you know, Miss 
Boston, at their meetings.” 

“ Can nane o’ them read ? Ye should get a schule-maister. 
But if it’s just somebody to read ye want, I’ll gie ye a gude 
subscription — I’ll send ye my laddie to read to them, he’s a 
gude reader.* I hear him read a chapter every night and a 
prayer. You heard him, Barbara ; do you think he w T ad do ? ” 

“ He reads very tolerably for his age and station, said Bar- 
bara, shortly. She had heard him read a prayer in which the 
royal family, the statesmen at the helm of affairs, the two 
houses of parliament, our armies by sea and land, and the 
children of this household, were all remembered in a row ; 
and she had listened to the reader’s sing-song tones without a 


76 


BLINDPITS. 


smile, although it did strike her that some of the petitions 
were not apposite to the circumstances. 

“You know, Miss Boston,” said Miss Jane, “it is a man of 
some intelligence that is required, who could throw in a word 
of explanation as he deemed it advisable. Pie is not required 
to select the works he reads, the committee do that.” 

“ Then ye think Davie wadna do ? Let me see what other 
folk gie, then.” 

“With pleasure,” said Miss Jane; “hut other people are 
not to he our rule. We are to give as we have prospered.” 

“ I’ve heard that,” said Miss Boston; “ 1 James Grant, £1, 
— weel done, James! I can do nothing like that, and really I 
canna see it’s a very crying case. If the men are ignorant an’ 
ken’t, they’re no far ahint ; they’ll no be lang ignorant if 
they’re worth a preen.” 

“ Ah ! hut who knows his own ignorance ? ” asked Miss 
Ann. 

“ They know it,” rejoined Miss Boston ; “ so I think they’re 
ower wise to need siller gathered for them. They ca’ them- 
selves the Ignorant Men’s Association.” 

“ But they didn’t give the association that name ; the com- 
mittee of the society did that,” explained Miss Ann. 

“ And do ony men gang to the meetings ? ” asked Miss 
Boston. 

“ Yes ; a considerable number.” 

“ They maun be a wheen gude-natured sumphs,” said Miss 
Boston, with animation ; “ they deserve some bawbees. Bar- 
bara, ye see better than me ; there’s an inkstand in the table- 
drawer, take a pen and put down my name for half-a-crown ; 
it’s mair that I intended to gie, but they deserve encourage- 
ment.” 

The amount of the subscription was of course no great sur- 
prise to the Misses Stark ; from experience they had ceased to 
expect the day of great things at Blindpits, but Barbara was 
struck with it as she marked it down. But she was struck 
with bliss Boston and all about her. She had expected that 
the visit would dovetail naturally into her last, and instead of 
that she found a great gulf. 


BLINDPITS. 


77 


The truth is, it is no mean part of the happiness of child- 
hood and youth that the eyes are holden that they cannot see. 
An ugly face is not ugly to a child, and a girl, unless she he 
fatally precocious, does not see all even of what passes before 
her, far less can she suspect w T hat she does not see. A person 
who is a shade more than ordinarily kind to a child may 
reckon upon being canonised, especially if/ in after life, cares 
be many and friends be few. Barbara’s memory had thrown 
a halo round Blindpits and its mistress, which khd evaporated 
like mist on coming in contact with them now — surely it was 
another house, another hostess, and another guest. 

At the primitive hour of nine, the Misses Stark’s servant 
arrived to take them home. They had always very young 
servants, and were marvellously fortunate in getting a succes- 
sion of girls who made no difficulty of conforming to the 
rather stringent regulations of Ashburn Cottage, — girls who 
made their work their pleasure, who would sit whole evenings 
alone, knitting or sewing, or reading any good profitable 
volume the Misses Stark might select for their perusal, and 
who rarely asked out except once a quarter or so, to take tea 
with, say — their grandmothers. The ladies heartily believed 
in this pattern girl. Before her mistresses were ready to start 
she had a precious half-hour, of social intercourse with Bell, 
heard the story of the egg with embellishments (it hardly 
needed any), and exchanged a few sheep-eye glances with the 
rustic groom of the chambers ; indeed, that youth, knowing 
the habits of the ladies when they arrived at Blindpits, walked 
away to Ashburn Cottage, spent the evening with the solitary 
hermit there, and escorted her in the moonlight to attend her 
mistresses. And there was nothing very depraved in this 
after all ; but the Misses Stark were not capable of imagining 
their handmaid guilty of it, and kept their faith in a creature 
— a kind of cross between a donkey and an angel. 


CHAPTER IX. 


Miss Bosto n went to bed rather exhausted with her day’s 
work. When -die was comfortably settled she said, “ Barbara, 
go downstairs/’ — Barbara at once thought she was going to 
send her to g* e Bell her dismissal, — “go down the stair and 
bring up my spectacles, or they’ll be broken in the morning 
maybe.” .Barbara went, and seeing the water-bottle empty, 
took it to get it filled. She walked into the kitchen, not 
thinking any harm of entering Bell’s domain. When she 
opened the door, however, she stopped — a man was sitting at 
the table opposite Bell, — his back was towards her. Bell 
started up and asked what she wanted ; the man turned round 
with a look of eager curiosity, and Barbara could hardly be- 
lieve her eyes. “ Mr. Pett-i-grew ! ” she exclaimed. 

“ Miss Barclay ! ” he stammered. 

“ I certainly did not anticipate seeing you here, Mr. Petti- 
grew.” 

“ Bell, here,” and he looked in her direction, “ is a cousin of 
mine, and when I’m in this part of the country I call on her.” 

“ Oh, indeed ! and when did you leave Berwick Street ? ” 

“ I haven’t been there since I saw you. I’ve been preach- 
ing, and the laborer is worthy of his hire, Miss Barclay.” 

“ Certainly.” 

Bell was standing, open-mouthed, with the replenished bot- 
tle in her hand, smiling, ready to make a third in the conver- 
sation ; which Barbara observing, did not approve of ; so she 
took her bottle, and said, “ Good ni'ght, Mr. Pettigrew,” before 
he had got any one of the numerous questions -put which were 
thronging to his tongue. 


BLINDPITS. 


79 


“ Preserve me, Peter ! ” said his cousin, “ how do ye ken her 
and what is she ? ” 

“ I know her, Bell, as well as I do you, and she is a very 
worthy, respectable woman. I’ll say that for her.” 

“ They say she’s some friend to the mistress, an she’s come 
to look after the siller ; if she gets a gude swatch o’t she’ll he 
worth looking after, Peter.” ' * 

“ Indeed ! ” said Peter ; “ no possible. 

“Ay, hut it is possible, though it may he a while yet. 
She’s a teugh auld body the mistress ; an’ what a birse she 
has — she threw an egg right in my face this very day; I 
thocht I wad hae a blue ee.” 

“ It was a pity to waste an egg,” said the careful Peter ; 
“ the best are eighteenpence in Ironburgh the now.” 

“Ye’ll no eat mony o’ them at that, Peter, I’m thinkin’. 
Ye was aye a saving chap : how muckle hae ye laid by yet, I 
wonder ? ” 

“ Laid by ! What can the like of me lay by ? But your 
mistress, Bell ; she’ll have plenty of friends besides Miss Bar- 
clay?” 

“Ho that come here.” 

“ Ay; they don’t come here, do they not ? How long have 
you been here, Bell ? ” 

“ This- is my third half-year, and I’m gaun to bide ; it’s no 
an ill place.” 

“ That’s right. Who of her friends do come ? ” 

“ Weel, there’s Grant the factor and his son — he is a mean 
character; he cam into this kitchen the other day, an’ askit 
me to clean his boots, an’ marched off, an’ a’ he said was 
‘ Thank you ; ’ lie’s ay like liimsel’, — an’ twa-three, mair.” 

“ Who more, Bell ? ” 

“What the wiser wad ye be, Peter, if I tell’d ye ? ye dinna 
ken ony o’ them.” 

Thus the door of information was suddenly slammed in Mr. 
Pettigrew’s face. Most people that had met Mr. Pettigrew 
oftener than once, exercised this bit of discipline upon him 
more or less politely ; still, the mass of information he man- 


80 


BLINDPITS. 


aged to get from the good-natured and unwary, and the kind 
of it, was surprising. 

“ But, Peter, you that’s aye sae gude at speerin’ questions, 
ye’ll can tell me about Miss Barclay. The doctor’s maid says 
her mother keeps a mangle.” 

“ Ay ; does the doctor’s maid say she keeps a mangle ? 
How does she know ? ” 

“ Weel, ye can gang an’ speer at her, Peter Pettigrew. 
Does she keep a mangle or no ? ” 

“Hot that I know of ; and if she did, I think I would have 
come to the knowledge of it.” 

“ Let ye alane, Peter.” 

“ But they might he the better of some siller for all that. 
What will the old lady he worth, think you ? ” and he put 
the question in an off-hand accidental way. 

“ A power o’ siller. I’ll no gie’t a name.” And Mr. Petti- 
grew, finding that he was not likely to gain further intelli- 
gence, departed, leaving a message for Miss Barclay that he 
would call on her friends when he got home, and let them 
know of her welfare, as if Miss Barclay and he had met on 
the edge of the Mallee Scrub. 

Barbara did not sleep much on her sofa that night, and 
once or twice in the coprse of it she heard Miss Boston give a 
deep sigh, followed by an “ Oh hone ! ” She made no sign of 
hearing, being aware that if Miss Boston had known she was 
awHke she would not have permitted herself even this indul- 
gence. Barbara pitied her old friend, but her feeling towards 
her was a little changed for the moment ; she had no sympa- 
thy with violent passion of any kind. She was accustomed 
to her mother’s querulous temper, and she' could allow for the 
want of self-control in childhood, but to see an aged person 
shaken by a gust of passion, appalled her. There was a 
minor point she did not like in Miss Boston — her liberal use 
of the broad mother-tongue. Bessie sometimes spoke it, and 
she reproved her by saying, that though she liked well enough 
to hear it from such persons as Mrs. Dods, she could not bear 
it in her. Barbara could not remember that Miss Boston used 


BLINDPITS. 


81 


to speak Scotch, and perhaps she had not spoken it. She 
could speak English as well as most Scotch people, hut Scotch 
was the language of her childhood, of the days when she had 
been happiest, and she had recurred to it almost entirely in 
her old age. However, it had been Barbara’s business, for 
many years, to speak and write the English language with 
extreme propriety, and the native Doric, I am sorry to say, 
was offensive in her ear. She was self-denying, self-sacrific- 
ing, laborious, kindly, and judicious ; and having such a con- 
stellation of virtues, I can afford to admit that she was some- 
what narrow in her views of human nature. 

Though her furlough was nearly out now, she had not had 
the heart to broach the subject of her departure, and this 
irreparable breach between Miss Boston and her servant com- 
plicated the situation. That cause of care, however, she 
found she might have dismissed. After the scene of yesterday 
she had fully expected that the parties would separate with 
one consent ; but, instead of that, neither made the slightest 
allusion to it, and seemed, if possible, on rather better terms 
than before. Barbara was not like the Stuarts, whom, it is 
said, that generally successful schoolmaster, Experience, never 
was able to teach anything ; she gathered from this fact, which 
took her so much by surprise, that it would be the part of 
wisdom not to intermeddle with Miss Boston’s arrangements. 

u I wonder what’s come o’ James Grant all this time,” said 
Miss Boston, “ and his sister ; she has not been here since 
you came, Barbara.” 

“ Perhaps you didn’t observe Miss Stark say she had been 
ill with cold ? ” 

“ They can aye sae mony folk that’s ill wi’ ae thing or 
anither, that it’s no easy keepin’ sight o’ them ; to hear them, 
ye wad think there are aye mair folk on the sick-list than off 
it ; but they are gude bodies, an’ to their credit never speak 
ill o’ folk, but oh, it’s wersh ! ” 

“ They seem, indeed, to be excellent ladies.” 

“ Ye may weel say that ; they’re away some gate the day 
saying the same o’ you ; a’body wi’ them are excellent men 
4* 


82 


BLINDPITS. 


and women. I dinna doubt they gang about plasterin’ and 
whitewasbin’ me, although you, Barbara, might think it a 
difficult job.” 

" I’m sure they are sincere. I don’t doubt love and respect 
for you bring them here.” 

“ Do ye think so ? Did love and respect bring you here, 
Barbara ? ” 

“ Yes,” said Barbara, “ they did.” 

Miss Boston was pleased — not visibly, however — she knew 
it was true. There was that about Barbara’s efficient loving- 
kindness that made itself felt as genuine without needing to 
be told so ; and she said, “ I wish they may keep you here, 
but it’s no easy driving oot o’ the bluid what’s bred in the 
bane.” 

Barbara understood this as an allusion to, or species of 
apology for, the exploit of yesterday, and she was touched that 
Miss Boston should apologise to her. That was an effort she 
could appreciate, for it cost herself a good deal to acknowledge 
to a fellow-creature that she was in the wrong; but she had 
been a feminine dominie for many years, and moreover she 
always tried hard to do what was right. She was saved the 
embarrassment of answering the implied confession by the 
entrance of Mr. Grant. 

“ What, Miss Boston ! not only up but down, I declare ; it 
is you who should be often ill, to set an example of getting 
quickly better,” exclaimed Mr. Grant. 

u Ay, if folk have mair days to live, James, they’ll live them 
ye see.” 

“ So I see ; and that’s the view you take of Dr. M’Vicar’s 
skill and Miss Barclay’s care. Poor encouragement, Miss 
Barclay ! ” and he looked towards the window where Barbara 
was sitting. 

“ As for the doctor,” said Miss Boston, u he kens best him- 
sel’ whether lie’s worked a miracle or no. He aye says a gude 
nurse is worth half a doctor, but I think a gude nurse is 
worth half-a-dozen doctors ; and Barbara is a gude nurse — a 
better couldna be.” 


BLTXDPITS. 


83 


11 Oil, Miss Boston ! ” said Barbara, “ I’m sure I have done 
nothing for you hut what any one would have done, except 
perhaps a pagan.” 

“ Weel, there’s plenty o’ pagans in the country, then,” 
rejoined Miss Boston. 

“I knew you were better,” said Mr. Grant, “but I didn’t 
expect to find you down stairs. I met Miss Ann Stark, and 
she told me, but she had barely time to speak ; she was on 
her way to the train, and was late. I don’t think she could 
possibly catch it.” 

Miss Boston was amused. It was a point of “ character ” 
in the Misses Stark to be usually late at railway stations. 

“ She’s accustomed to that,” said Miss Boston, “ and it 
wadna distress her ; but, James, siller maun be turning plenty 
at Grantsburn.” 

“ What evidence of that have you ? ” 

“ Or maybe Jean Stark has found out the way to get round 


ye.” 

“ Oh, my subscription for the reader ! Well, I think that 
a good object. At any rate, they can’t do much mischief with 
twenty shillings.” 

“ Do mischief ! if that’s a’ ye ken about things, the sooner 
ye join the association the better. I’m sure Jean Stark didna 
gie ye that for a rule o’ liberality ; but I’ll tell ye ae piece o’ 
mischief it did — it made me gie half-a-crown.” 

“Well, if it dosen’t do more, I’ll not be very guilty. 
We’re expecting Mrs. Bichardson and Graham. They’ll 
likely be over to see you, Miss Boston. Do you think you 
could venture as far as Grantsburn to see them ? ” 

“ Weel, James, I really dinna think I’m able, so ye’ll 
excuse me.” 

“ But you’ll spare Miss Barclay, to us ? My sister is sorry, 
Miss Barclay, that she hasn’t been able to call, but she’ll send 
for you on Friday, if you’ll come to us.” 

“ Thank you,” said Barbara ; “ but in Miss Boston’s present 
state I would rather stay with her when my visit is to be so 
short.” 


84 


BLINDPITS. 


u Nonsense ! ” said Miss Boston, u you’ll be a gude bairn 
and gang. What’s to make your visit so short ? ” 

11 1 must go home. Perhaps at another time I may have 
the pleasure of going to Grantsburn.” 

“ Mr. Grant is a rich man, is he not ? ” asked Barbara of 
Miss Boston, when he had gone. “ I have heard so, and that 
he drives a carriage and pair.” 

“ He got a covered-in thing, and a pownie, to tak his sister 
to the kirk. Ye can ca’t a carriage and pair if ye like ; and 
for being rich, it depends on what ye mean by rich. He has 
a gude yearly income, but he has had to help his brothers, and 
nearly to keep a widowed sister and her family ; but her ain 
have all died, and she has only a stepson now, Graham, that 
he spoke o’. But ye should hae gane to Grantsburn, Barbara. 
It’s a fine place, and ye never can tell where a blister’ll 
light.” 

Barbara colored. In the recesses of her proper governess 
soul she felt that Miss Boston was coarse. Miss Boston 
might be coarse, but she had stated a truth. Her own blister 
had been a very remarkable one. It was half-a-century since 
it had been rudely torn away. The flesh could not be very 
tender now, surely, but the memory of it even yet could send 
the blood creeping into her withered cheeks. 

After the blister remark there was a long pause. Then 
Miss Boston said, “ His marriage was anything but happy.” 
She had a knack of resuming a subject after it had been 
dropped and forgotten, as if there had been no interval. 

“ Whose marriage ? asked Barbara. 

“ James Grant’s. It did not last long, and it was as weel, 
for*the woman was a gowk ; but if there’s a gowk in a 
family, she’s aye first married.” 

" My mother and she were intimate, and she liked her.” 

Miss Boston could hardly say to Barbara that she consid- 
ered Mrs. Barclay such another ; and the topic was changed 
by Barbara explaining the necessity she was under of going 
home speedily. Then Miss Boston thought she was ill-used 
and lost hey temper ; and no more was said. 


BLINDPITS. 


85 


Barbara pittied Miss Boston, and loved her ; but in her own 
independent middle life she felt so able to stand alone that 
she did not comprehend the feebleness of age creeping on 
without a friendly arm to lean on, or the desolation of a per- 
son sitting in front of the grave without a gleam of close 
human sympathy; or if she was aware of it in general, she 
lid not attach the idea of weakness either of body, or at least 
of mind, to Miss Boston. Was it not the constant effort of 
that lady to conceal all such weakness ? 

“Besides,” thought Barbara, “ she is not such an object of 
pity after all. She will not be more solitary than she has been 
for years, and she is rich.” 

Miss Barclay’s own worrying trials had arisen so much 
from want of money, that it was natural for her to think that 
where plenty of that was life must be much smoother sailing. 
However, she had no choice, she must go home and work for 
her household. And Miss Boston tried to think herself ill- 
used. She had made up her mind when she sent for Barbara 
that she would remain permanently ; instead of which Miss 
Barclay had stayed a fortnight only, and was going away with 
no further explanation than that she must u resume her teach- 
ing.” She gave no hint of difficulties or anxiety, nor even let 
fall a word betraying dissatisfaction with her lot. If she had, 
Miss Boston might have acted differently; as it was, pride 
stopped her from proposing any arrangement whereby she 
might have induced Barbara to stay — and she went. 


CHAPTER X. 


The weather had been of the bleakest during Barbara’s 
visit — alternate frost and thaw, with driving showers of sleet, 
hut the sun shone on her departure. Snow to the depth of 
some inches had fallen during the night, more noiselessly than 
ever was the tread of list shoe ; it had spread its pure beauty 
down to the "very edge of the sea. Having its own way most 
places, perhaps it wondered why, with all its quiet persistency, 
it could not change the color of that great Ethiopian of a sea. 
The air was perfectly still and clear, and the sun caused some- 
thing like warmth, so like that by mid-day little columns of 
insects, made up mostly of wings and legs, hailing from they 
best knew where, danced by the side of Miss Boston’s hushes. 
Was that mad dance the measure of their lives ? and, having 
had their fling, were they content to die and he no more ? or 
what became of them ? The blackbird hopping about might 
tell, if his golden beak could speak. Under the impression 
that insects and sunshine were going to be plentiful now, he 
has let loose a note, but only one ; something told him he was 
premature. 

It was partly Barbara’s nature, it was wholly her habit, to 
think of others before herself. Had she considered her own 
comfort at this time, she would have left Blindpits in the 
morning, so as to have reached home before the close of the 
day ; but she chose to travel after nightfall rather than break 
in on Miss Boston’s usual habits. She had a tender heart, 
Barbara, and when she was Helping her old friend to dress, 
she felt as if she were doing almost a guilty thing in leaving 
her. 


BLINDPITS. 


87 


Miss Boston did not say much, except a grim “ Thank you ” 
now and again ; and she did not submit to being helped so 
graciously as she had done.- She told Bell to have an early 
dinner ready for Miss Barclay, and then sat down on a chair 
and watched her putting her slender luggage together. She 
said suddenly, “ When are you coming hack again ? ” 

“ Dear Miss Boston, I would come very soon if it depended 
only on myself ; and I will come in summer if I can.” 

“ Weel, come ; if I’m livin’ I’ll he here, and if I’m no livin' 
ye’ll likely hear tell o’t.” 

“ But you will write, Miss Boston — you’ll surely write to 
me?” 

u USTo, I never write ; there’s naebody livin’ that I care for 
writin’ to ; and I havena written a letter for mony a day.” 

“ But it will he cruel not to let me know how you are. Per- 
haps one of the Misses Stark would write for you ? ” 

u Well, we’ll see. Ye may leave an envelope directed to 
yoursel’, and I’ll maybe manage to scrape a line.” 

After her guest went away, Miss Boston sat in her chair 
again and looked long into the fire. What saw she there ? 
We know what young dreamers see — hut aged dreamers ! — 
their castles have all fallen, ghosts flit in and out among the 
ruins ; their journey is behind them, and they are nearing the 
last milestone. Happy they if at the end they shall find en- 
trance into one of the many mansions ! 

Governesses are a numerous class as society is constituted. 
They may present picturesque points, and consequently have 
been often seized upon by the novelist, and rendered with good 
and striking effect. We have the unprincipled scheming gov- 
erness ; the good, gentle, trampled-on governess ; the auto- 
maton governess ; the madly impassioned ; the prim and 
frightfully proper ; the nobly ambitious ; and the governess 
who is strikingly clever and always mistress of the situation. 
Barbara was none of these ; neither was she a good woman of 
startling conversational powers, or an “ awfu’ gift o’ the gab,” 
as Miss Boston would have said. This was a comfort. It 
takes a man in robust health of body and mind, to stand 


8 


BLINDPJTS. 


unshaken the constant intelligent conversation of a lady, who 
speaks the English language with extreme propriety. Solo- 
mon, wide as his knowledge of society was, must have missed 
this type, or he would not have given the palm to her brawl- 
ing sister. There may he variety in brawling, and in listen- 
ing to it you can have a sense of being holier than she; but 
the lady who won’t take a short cut, who won’t make a gram- 
matical slip, but keeps on, with a six-governess power of 
speaking with propriety, you know in your heart to be an 
estimable character, and yet flesh and blood can hardly stand 
her, and you feel yourself a double-dyed miscreant because you 
don’t enjoy her society. 

Barbara was simply a type, with modifications, of a great 
army of single women, — an army, but at war with nothing 
and nobody — not with their own lots or society, but able and 
willing to do their duty in the positions assigned to them ; — 
women leading what appears a second-hand kind of life, but 
probably unconscious of it ; of average abilities and education, 
but of sound vivid conscience, working as in the eye of the 
master, and willing to wait for their wages till the end of the 
day. Such was my heroine, for though you may not consider 
her to be so, when you come to the end of the story, she is my 
heroine, and I hereby throw down the glove, and defend her 
against all comers. 

Miss Barclay had a proper pride. Above all, she never 
forgot that she was a lady born and bred ; consequently the 
color mounted to her face, and she looked round carefully to 
see if any of the few people who knew her were in sight 
before she went up to the window and asked a third-class ticket 
to Ironburgh, with the view of counterbalancing her cab 
expenses : she had driven to the station, as she could not afford 
to run the risk of damp feet. Then she ensconced herself in 
her carriage at once, feeling that, though she was not doing a 
guilty thing, or a thing the laws of the country would take . 
cognisance of, she would rather not be caught in the act. 
Great good sense, much hard labor, and ample opportunity for 
learning to estimate things at their true value, had not yet 
done their perfect work in Miss Barclay. 


BLINDPITS. 


89 


The compartment was suddenly darkened by a woman 
standing on the steps and holding on with both hands ; her 
head was turned round, and she was exclaiming in shrill 
excited tones, “ Guard, guard, must I change carriages at the 
Ramsay Junction ? ” She looked like a bird fluttering on the 
bars of its cage, or a hat hanging against a wall in the sum- 
mer twilight. Barbara recognized her voice, and touching her 
said, “ Come in, Miss Stark, you’ll easily ascertain that when 
we come to the junction.” 

“Miss Barclay! Bo you think so? Well, I’ll trust to 
you. So you take third class like me? Jane insists on it, 
though I think it scarcely befits papa’s daughter’s ; but I have 
never met with anything unpleasant : working men are very 
civil and obliging, often more so than people pretending to be 
gentlemen. I would prefer first class, of course, but Jane 
proportions our expenditure on system. We have what we 
call our 1 give-away purse,’ for charity and other things you 
know ; and she says if we travel first class we must give first 
class too, and we can’t afford that, but we can do both third 
class, and we’ll do it.” 

Now you may call these ladies goody, and the term fits ; 
but if we must smile at their weakness, why not imitate their 
strength ? Here were they denying themselves, and denjung 
themselves at a point which was double self-denial to them, 
that their expenditure might be a consistent and well propor- 
tioned whole. How many of us, quite able and willing to 
laugh at the Misses Stark, do that ? 

Miss Ann Stark talked to Miss Barclay all the way. She 
was not even like singing-birds, who sink to silence if you 
darken their cage ; a tunnel only made her tones rather louder, 
making up by sound for the want of sight. Barbara did not 
hear the fourth part of what she said, though she tried hard 
for a time to do so ; but it sufficed to nod intelligently at inter- 
vals till they parted at the Junction. Then her thoughts were 
at leisure to travel either back or forward. Her heart ached 
about leaving Miss Boston. She recalled her ; her figure still 
retaining much of its early elegance, her face shrunken by 


90 


BLINDPITS. 


age, her neat ways, her nice personal habits — her bodily or 
mental disquietude were great indeed if ever her bed-clothes 
were tossed or tumbled ; She might have been a tall doll with 
a wayworn face, undergoing a season of affliction in that bed, 
so exact were all its appointments. Contrasted with this, the 
Miss Boston of her childhood came so vividly before her that 
tears filled her eyes, and she would have gone back had it 
been possible. 

If Miss Boston could have known all this, no doubt she 
would have left Barbara her fortune on the spot ; but she did 
not know it, — she could not even imagine it. She sat and 
stared into the fire, most likely thinking she had no hold on 
human kindness except through her purse, and even in extrem- 
ity despising the attention that could be bought with money, 
and saying that as she had lived alone she could but die alone. 
Possibly she was thus driven up closer to the Elder Brother ; 
who can tell ? Miss Boston never in her life opened the 
deeper floodgates of her heart to a human being. 

Barbara had only been a fortnight away, and it looked like 
months. It seemed as if everything must be changed. She 
walked into the little sitting-room she had left such a short 
time before, and found a change which startled her nearly as 
much as Dr. Primrose was startled when he approached his 
apparently quiet and tranquil dwelling only to see flames burst 
from every window. However, it was nothing so startling on 
the surface ; indeed it was a threatened evil to which parents 
and guardians are generally represented as being singularly 
blind. Her mother and Miss Dobbie were seated at a small 
table drawn up to the fire playing backgammon, while Bessie 
and Mr. Graham Richardson (Mrs. Dods’s lodger) were sitting 
on the sofa with their heads bent over a book lying open on 
the table. Both were laughing heartily when they looked up 
to see who entered. 

“Aunt Barbara!” cried Bessie, jumping up, “Pm glad 
you’re home again.” 

“Well, Barbara, you’ve got back again,” said Mrs. Barclay, 
in measured tones, meant to convey, “ You’ve come back from a 
sleeveless errand, of course.” 


BLINDPITS. 


91 


“And liow blooming you look; the change has done you 
good,” said Miss Dobbie. 

“ Oh, Mr. Richardson, aunt doesn’t know you — aunt, Mr. 
Richardson. I declare I forgot we had only got acquainted 
since you went aw T ay.” 

Mr. Richardson shook hands with Miss Barclay, and with 
the others too. It seemed he was going to leave. 

“ You needn’t run away though aunt’s come,” said Bessie, 
“ see, you are forgetting your hook.” 

“ No, thank you ; I’ll get it w T hen you’re done with it.” 

He was no sooner gone than Miss Barclay looked at the 
book ; it was an innocent enough w 7 ork of fiction. She asked 
Bessie what they had been laughing at ; and when she read 
the passage, she said, “ She saw nothing very laughable in 
that ” — which was not to be wondered at, for she had not a 
quick sense of the absurd ; and, moreover, the common run of 
people are not so easily sat laughing at forty as at sixteen. 
To be sure, Mr. Dods could laugh at funny things with the 
youngest, but, as Mr. Richardson had said, it is an attribute of 
genius to be always young. 

“You had^better finish the book, Barbara; just finish the 
book before you take off your cloak and give us any news of 
your visit,” said her mother, burning with impatience. 

“ I can soon tell you my news. Miss Boston is nearly well,’* 
and then Barbara gave a minute account of her visit, describ- 
ing the people she had seen, etc. 

“ And you say Mr. Grant is very often at Blindpits ? ” 

“I said he was two or three times there. He seems a 
pleasant man ; if I had not been a little prejudiced, I would 
have said very pleasant, indeed.” 

“ He may well be pleasant,” said Mrs. Barclay ; “ no doubt 
he has buttered his own bread thickly enough.” 

“ It may be ; but Miss Boston always speaks of him with 
respect, which I don’t think she w r ould do, if he had made any 
undue attempts in that way.” 

“There are many ways of doing things, Barbara; and I 
daresay Mr. Grant is chuckling over your simplicity at this 


92 


BLINDP1TS. 


moment in leaving Miss Boston, and throwing away such an 
opportunity as you may never get again.” * 

“ But what could I do ? We couldn't live at present on the 
future uncertain chance of Miss Boston’s ‘money.” 

“ It’s no chance, or it shouldn’t he. I’m her nearest kin, 
nearer than the Grants, who are only a cousin’s husband and 
son; and common sense should have told you, Barbara, to 
remain and see justice done.” 

“ If I had remained, I could not, and would not, have men- 
tioned the subject. Money is much, but self-respect is more, 
much more, and better, and nobler.” 

“But a lean bone to pick in poverty and obscurity, Bar- 
bara.” 

“ I consider it satisfying food, either in adversity or pros- 
perity ; but don’t distress yourself unnecessarily, mother. 
Miss Boston, we know, has not forgotten us at any rate. She 
has all her senses as thoroughly as ever, and I don’t doubt but 
she’ll leave her money justly. I would not count on it, but I 
think so. If she leaves us any, let us be thankful ; or if not, 
let us say she had a right to do as she liked with her own.” 

“ But she hasn’t — she has no right, whatever,” exclaimed 
Mrs Barclay. 

“ How old is Mr. Grant, Miss Barclay ? ” asked Miss Dob- 
bie. She was in the habit of asking apparently irrelevant 
questions. 

“ I don’t know — probably forty or a little more.” 

“ Then I’ll tell you the very plan,” exclaimed Miss Dobbie, 
briskly. “ You and he should marry ; if the money’s left 
between you that would keep it together, and if it’s all left to 
him you would get the use of it. Of course the idea is not 
my own, it has often occurred in novels and plays, but I have 
known instances of it in real life ; and when the parties aro 
suitable, like you and Mr. Grant, it answers very well.” 

Even Mrs. Barclay could not forbear smiling. 

“ If you could suggest it to Mr. Grant,” said Bessie ; “ but 
you know aunt couldn’t make the proposal.” 

“ Certainly not — most assuredly not — I never meant that, 
you know. But it’s quite as likely to occur to him as to me.” 


BLINDPITS. 


93 


“ Hardly, Miss Dobbie, I doubt,” said Barbara. “ Every- 
body has not your ingenuity.” 

“ But unless he' were quite suitable otherwise, I would on 
no account have you marry him for money ; still, money 
enables one to move in good society, and that would be a great 
advantage to Bessie at her time of life.” 

“ Untelling! And what society have we, or can we have, 
here ? ” groaned Mrs. Barclay. 

“ Society, Grandmamma ! Have we not a poet and a 
preacher next door, not to say a lawyer — isn’t Mr. Richardson 
a lawyer, Miss Dobbie ? ” 

“ He said he was in a lawyer’s office, meantime.” 

“Well; a poet, a preacher, and a lawyer — that’s surely 
good society, grandmamma.” 

“ Society, indeed ! Mr. Richardson is a gentlemanly lad, but 
though he may live in this quarter now for the sake of economy, 
he’ll have too many introductions to good society to waste time 
on us. But it’s well for you, Bessie, that you have a good 
fund of merriment, for as things are likely to be managed 
you’ll need it all yet, my dear.” And Mrs. Barclay withdrew 
into the region of sighs. If she had been told that she was a 
selfish incubus upon a brave little household trying to keep 
its head above water, she would have doubted her ears. Bar- 
bara loved her mother, not with the all-confiding love she 
would have felt for a devoted self-sacrificing mother, — she loved 
her by instinct and habit, and always remembered that she was 
a woman of many sorrows. But for a gleam of approbation or 
comfort she never looked to her. In the course of time it is 
probable Barbara might have grown hard, even sternly virtuous, 
but for the influence of her brother’s child. To know and 
feel Bessie’s love, surrounding her like an atmosphere, was in 
its effects like rain on the mown grass, and her love to Bessie 
was her strongest earthly passion. To shelter her, to walk 
along with her in a quiet straight line, to the end, was her 
highest wish ; but whose life is a straight line? We are sent 
long rounds to gather experience — to the right to meet a grief 
we never looked for; to the left to garner joy that was hidden 
like honey in the rock. 


CHAPTER XI. 


It might have been thought that by this time Miss Barclay 
would have learnt that sufficient to the day is the evil thereof, 
and would have kept herself from worrying about future con- 
tingencies. Yet her alarm on finding Mr. Richardson so 
familiarly ensconced in her dovecot did not speedily subside. 
She was not one of those blind guardians — most conveniently 
blind for story-telling purposes — who never waken up to the 
fact that their children are anything but children, till, some 
fine day, the reins are jerked out of their hands, and they are 
left standing astounded, w r atching the chariot of young life 
whirl off on its own account. 

Bessie was very young, it is true, but Barbara had had 
instances; oftener than once, of great precocity in this line 
among her pupils. Only a few weeks before, one of the 
Misses Leadbitter, about Bessie’s age, had had a love’s young 
dream rudely broken up by being despatched to a remote 
French town, there to be under the care of the Protestant 
pastor and his wife — an arrangement from which her mamma 
hoped the best effects. Barbara hoped and believed better 
things of her niece; but the bare possibility made her 
shudder. She asked Miss Dobbie, when she had an oppor- 
tunity, how often Mr. Richardson had called. Miss Dobbie 
could be asked a question without immediately laying a line of 
motives up to it, and another line of schemes away from it. 

u Three times,” she said ; “ and she had not been more 
pleased with any young man for a long time.” 

Miss Barclay resolved that, gradually and quietly, his 


BLINDPITS. 


95 


acquaintance should be dropped ; that, she thought, would 
not be difficult, and would be safe. 

“ Bessie,” she said, “ Mrs. Dods’s lodger seems rather a nice 
lad ? ” 

“ Who — Mr. Richardson ? Yes ; very.” 

“ How did you get acquainted with him ? ” 

“ Well, I don’t know that I should tell you.” 

“ Hot tell me ! Why, what should prevent you ? ” 

“ Because it’s connected with a secret.” 

“ A secret ? ” 

“ Yes ; a secret that only he and I know.” 

“ And that I am not to know ? ” 

“ You needn’t look so serious, aunt Barbara. I daresay I 
might tell you if you would promise not to tell any one, 
especially Mr. — ” 

“Mr. Who ? ” asked Miss Barclay, anxiously. 

“ Mr. Pettigrew,” and Bessie fell into a fit of merry laugh- 
ter. 

“ Don’t trifle, Bessie.” 

“ I’m not trifling. He’s so awfully curious, and Mr. Dods 
does not want him to know.” 

“What has Mr. Dods to do with it?” 

“ He has everything to do with it, I’m sorry to say. But 
you haven’t promised not to tell ? ” 

“ I promise.” 

“ Then you knew it’s some time ago — a good while before 
you went away — Mr. Dods sent some poems to the editor of 
the Ironburgh Magazine, and he got a complimentary letter 
with them when they were sent back ; then he sent them to 
the editor again, offering them for nothing, and he has been 
expecting to hear of them or see them in the Magazine ever 
since, and has written about them twice ; and no notice of 
any kind has been taken of them or him — a shame such 
usage ; and he an old man too ; only the editor thinks him a 
boy, which shows that editors are no wiser than other people. 
Mr. Dods, Mr. Richardson, and I, have had consultations on 
the subject — that’s how I know Mr. Richardson. And really 


96 


BLINDPITS. 


I find him conversible ; and it’s as well to get books direct 
from himself as through Mr. Dods.” 

“ I don’t know,” said aunt Barbara, somewhat relieved now 
that the momentous secret was laid hare ; u you know he is 
engaged all day ; and I shouldn’t like to have your lessons 
often interrupted in the same evening.” 

“ No ; not often, of course. I think you would like him. 
Do you know, I took an opportunity of reading to him. I 
didn’t tell him the object I had in view, but I wanted an 
impartial opinion, and I think he is likely to be a good judge. 
He said I read admirably ; that I had a talent for it decidedly, 
he thought. Then he said, 1 Women read in public now ; but 
if I had sisters who wanted to do that, I wouldn’t let them.’ 
‘ Why not ? ’ I said. ‘ Just because — . I had a little brother 
that used to. say that when you asked him the reason of any- 
thing.’ ‘ But that’s no reason,’ I said. ‘ It is better than a 
reason. It left you to gather up all that was in his mind that 
he couldn’t express.’ ‘ But I can’t gather up what’s in your 
mind.’ ‘ For one thing, appearing in public rubs the bloom 
off a woman.’ ‘ Does starving in private preserve her bloom ? ’ 

‘ But she shouldn’t starve ; men should work for her.’ 1 But 
if she has no men? ’ 1 She ought to have ; that’s all.’ I said, 

1 Even if I had men to work for me, I would rather — that is, 
if they expected me to mend their shirts — I would rather read 
for so many guineas a night and be independent. It is a 
frightful business mending things, especially shirts. i I don’t 
know anything about that.’ 1 Neither do I ; but I can imag- 
ine what it is.” 

“ Bessie,” said Miss Barclay, “ did you really run on in 
that way to a perfect stranger ? ” 

“ A stranger ! I had seen him often before I spoke to him , 
and I had spoken twice to him before we had that discussion. 
How long should people know each other before they get 
beyond the weather ? ” 

“ I recollect my grandmamma used to say that you should 
know a person seven years before you took the liberty of snuff- 
ing the candles, or poking the fire.” 


BLINDPITS. 


97 


“ Ay ; but you see people travelled in wagons or on pillions 
in those days, and things had to be consistent.” 

“ To rattle on in that way with me or Mrs. Pods, Bessie, is 
all very well, but ” — 

“ It’s better with Mr. Bichardson ; he puts his mind to you, 
as Dr. Johnson says.” 

“ Beally, Bessie, don’t be ridiculous. Nobody quotes in 
society. At one time you repeat phrases you have read as if 
you were an oracle, and the next you are positively childish, 
suggesting, as you did when the price of bread rose, that we 
should live on rolls, which are always the same price.” 

“ I’m not good at arithmetic. Mr. Bichardson says I’m 
behind in that ; he offered to give me lessons in it once or 
twice a-week if I liked.” 

“ If you like to pay attention, I am quite equal to teaching 
you arithmetic.” 

“He said he would teach me book-keeping by double 
entry ? ” 

“ Do you want to learn book-keeping by double entry ? ” 

“ Well, yes ; it might be useful, you know.” 

“ Then I’ll teach you.” 

“ 0 aunt ! do you know it ? ” 

“ I’m teaching it at present to one of my pupils — one of the 
boys.” 

“ Then that will be better. I wouldn’t like Mr. Bichardson 
to know how stupid I am.” 

The prudent aunt lost a night’s sleep planning how best to 
stifle this acquaintance that had grown up like Jonah’s gourd 
in her short absence. Mr.* Bichardson might be good, or he 
might be bad, or both, or neither ; but quietly and effectually 
his visits must be discouraged. Any danger beyond dreamy 
idleness she did not anticipate for Bessie ; but in her circum- 
stances that was enough — or in any circumstances. 

Now, if Miss Barclay had been less anxious and more trust- 
ful, she might have saved herself all this vexation. Bessie 
was as innocent of all thoughts of Mr. Bichardson, or any 
other person in the shape of a lover, as the chair over which 
5 


98 


BLINDPITS. 


slie threw her gown at night ; and if Miss Barclay could only 
have gone into Mr. Bichardson’s room, and over his shoulder 
read the letter he was writing, she would have been instantly 
lightened of all her care on this score. That letter was to 
this effect : 

“Dear John — You don’t write often, and when you do 
write, why do you so studiously omit all reference to S. A. ? 
But if I am to write at all I must write of her. J ack, I love 
her as never man loved woman. She is my last thought at 
night and my first in the morning. I shall never love 
another ; and if she is to he won by man, I’ll win her. 

“ I can’t flatter myself that I have made much way yet. 
Being a little older than I, she gives herself airs of wisdom, 
and she is kind — very kind ; if she would only he less kind, 
or in a different way, somehow, I would have more hope. I 
sometimes envy you, J ack, your plain sailing ; yet no, I like a 

chase, if only I were less miserable. If I lose her — then 

I must stop — the idea drives me mad. 

“ I have got acquainted with a pretty girl next door, little 
more than a child. She says queer things, at least for a child 
to say ; hut I fancy she has never been among children, and 
she lives with a lot of funny old women, and crams her little 
head with all manner of hooks. If I could talk as freely to 
S. A. as to her, I would get on. What I would give to talk 
over her head, and make her feel that I am a man and her 
master. I think she fancies I’m a hoy. I can’t go to the A.’s 
every night ; hut I contrive very often to meet her brother as 
he is going home in the evening, and he can hardly help ask- 
ing me to go with him ; and then, 0 Jack ! I wonder if I ap- 
pear to other people the fool I feel myself to he ; hut unless 
she’s a stone I’ll win her yet,” etc. etc. 

This letter, when finished, was addressed, 

“John Grant, Esq., 

“ Grantsburn, Hcatherburgh.” 

Mr. J ohn opened it at the breakfast-table. 


BLINDPITS. 


99 


“ That’s a letter from Graham, isn’t it ? ” said Miss Grant. 

“ Yes.” 

“ And what’s he saying. Is he well ? ” 

“ Hm ! — saying ? He’s saying he’s a fool — a rash impru- 
dent fool ; and I quite agree with him.” 

“ What’s he been doing? ” asked Mr. Grant senior, quietly. 

“Read that,” said John; “or, aunt, you had better read it 
aloud,” and he handed it across the table. 

How a letter of this kind, written at midnight under the 
gas, when read in the cool clear light of morning by people 
only interested in it, can hardly look otherwise than foolish. 

“ Poor boy ! ” said Mr. Grant, kindly. 

“ That’s what is called calf-love, isn’t it ? ” said Miss Grant ; 
“ it will probably pass off.” 

“ Pass off ! — little fear ; at least the love may, but not the 
lady,” said John. “ The great simpleton, he is so afraid of 
losing her ; why, they’ll have him tied neck and heels before 
he knows where he is. She is a dozen years older than he 
the oldest of half-a-score who haven’t a rap in the world, he a 
likely young fellow ; having waited so long, she’s safe to wait a 
little longer.” 

“ Do you know all that ? ” asked his father. 

“ Yes ; and, what’s more, he knows it, for I picked it out of 
him.” 

“ But she may be a good girl for all that,” said Miss Grant. 

“ Yes, she may,” said her brother ; “ but a boy at his age is 
a poor judge in such matters — a poor judge — it’s a pity.” It 
is possible Mr. Grant was thinking of his own boyish wedding, 
which had produced such a meagre crop of happiness. 

“ Had you not better write to him, James, and give him a 
word of warning — say how imprudent it is ? ” 

“ But it is not imprudent if the lady w;ere suitable. He is 
every way likely to get a good situation as soon as he is ready 
for it. The Marquis is to use his interest for him on my 
recommendation, and he has not a close tie in the world. If I 
were to interfere, he would think I was taking advantage of 
the small obligations I had laid him under, and in any case he 


100 


BLINDPITS. 


would resent interference. I know how he would feel, quite 
well ; but, perhaps, you or his mother could make a delicate 
job of it.” 

“ I have said all to him on the subject that I can ; hut he 
is bent on making a mess of it, and you’ll find it so,” said 
John. 

“I’ll write, however,” said Miss Grant, “and try what I 
can do, only I would like to know the lady ; hut whatever she 
is, she is too old for him. Poor Graham ! it’s a pity he should 
throw himself away.” 

Thus Miss Barclay, Mr. and Miss Grant, and his step- 
mother, were all filled with anxious thoughts about “poor 
Graham ; ” while he, now in a state of elation and now in 
despair, found time and heart to sympathize with his landlord 
on the injustice and cruelty of the editor of the Ironburgh 
Magazine , who persisted in making no sign, although he got 
three letters, one after another, from his supposed juvenile 
contributor, which he tossed into the waste-basket after merely 
glancing his eye over them. He was past enjoying curiosities 
of this kind, and went through his work as a surgeon goes 
through his operations — doing his best, and keeping his feel- 
ings in his pocket, finding it dangerous to expose them to the 
open air. 


CHAPTEE XII. 


Miss Barclay had her own ideas as to who should tempt 
the responsibilities of print, and it was her opinion that the 
presumption and self-conceit of Mr. Bods were unbounded. 
She sympathized with Mrs. Bods, as was natural, for were 
they not both the working bees of their respective households ? 
Undoubtedly Mr. Bods was self-conceited, but you could 
hardly wish him otherwise ; it was the relish in his character, 
it was so very genuine and unadulterated; without it he 
would have been a pitiable object indeed — a snail abroad in a 
very rough world without his Tshell. 

I could have liked to have drawn Mrs. Bods sitting at her 
husband’s feet, worshipping in wifely fashion, and sacrificing 
herself, a willing and barely conscious victim, on the altar of 
duty and affection ; but, given a man, or woman either, who 
shirks the duties of life, and you can hardly expect that the 
persons who are doomed to be ground along with them in the 
quern, one stone of which is very limited means, and the 
other constant anxiety, will exhibit all the suavity, the bloom, 
the efflorescence, which they might have done in different 
circumstances. But they may love each other dearly for all 
that. Mr. and Mrs. Bods loved each other, so did Miss Bar- 
clay and her mother; still, there was the daily jar and worry, 
of which, when death comes, the survivor feels all the guilt, 
and would give the world to have an opportunity of wiping it 
out ; although I take leave to doubt, if the opportunity were 
granted, the jar and worry would begin again. Who knows ? 

Miss Barclay was returning from her daily labor, and she 


102 


BLINDPITS. 


was thinking, with very small complacency, of Mr. Dods ; not 
that she despised him — she despised no one — but she was 
angry, rather unreasonably, with poor Mr. Dods. She was 
annoyed at what she thought his most absurd presumption, 
and at his making Bessie his confidant ; but the root of her 
annoyance was the fact that he had brought Bessie and Mr. 
Bichardson together, u to consult ” about his trash. 

She was just feeling provoked at this when the unconscious 
Mr. Dods came alongside of her and lifted his hat. He had 
never worked much for his wife, and it had never struck him 
as out of place that she should work pretty hard for him ; but 
he had a kind of chivalry in his manner towards women, and 
he lifted his hat to Miss Barclay. She had no wish for his 
company at the moment, but he kept by her, and in a few 
minutes Mr. Bichardson passed them at a rapid pace, hardly 
giving Miss Barclay time to bestow upon him the style of bow 
she had planned as best calculated to keep him at a distance. 

“ The lad’s in a hurry the night,” said Mr. Dods. “ I’m 
thinking he’s away to see his sweetheart.” 

“ Indeed!” said Barbara, with animation, anl a sudden 
relenting towards her companion. 

“ Ay ; I jalouse so. No that he ever told me in so many 
w r ords, but I can put that and that thegether. He runs in 
and dresses himsel’, and runs out again, and comes back either 
unco low or unco high in the spirits ; and I whiles get bits o’ 
paper lying about his room with c Sarah Anderson ’ written a’ 
ower them, or a verse to S. A., or something o’ that kind ; and 
I’ve watched the symptoms, for I have a strong interest in the 
laddie ; no to say that I’m engaged on a poem entitled ‘ Young 
Love/ and it’s useful to hae a model sitting afore ye.” 

An expression akin to contempt appeared in Miss Barclay’s 
face. She said, u Would old love not be a more appropriate 
theme for you, Mr. Dods ? ” 

“ I’ll no say — I’ll maybe try my hand on that next ; but it’s 
aye best to begin at the beginning.” 

“ There’s so much poetry made already, Mr. Dods, that I 
think you might despair of putting anything in a newer or 
better light.” 


BLINDPITS. 


103 


“ There’s no call for onybody to despair, Miss Barclay. I 
was just readin’ Goldsmith the other night, and it struck me I 
wasna unco far ahint him, and lie’s lived and will live.” 

“ How many people read him ? I understand such a style 
as his is obsolete now.” 

“Ay; but folk maun be brought back to intelligible lan- 
guage, and weaned frae the balderdash that’s ca’ed poetry 
now, that can be made neither head nor tail o’.” 

“ If you think you can do that, Mr. Dods ; but it would 
have been easier and better for you if you had happened to 
have been born a hundred years sooner.” 

“ Maybe, maybe ; I wadna been soomin against the tide.” 

They were near their own door, and met Mrs. Dods. 
“ Tammas,” she said, “ gang yont to thae folk and tell them 
to send a cart o’ coals the first thing in the morning ; and see, 
here’s the siller to pay for them. The first thing in the morn- 
ing,” she repeated after him, “ or there’ll be nae breakfast in 
the house.” 

Mr. Dods obeyed. 

“Do you think the gudeman’s looking onything weel?” 
said Mrs. Dods to Miss Barclay. “ I whiles fancy no.” 

“ Oh, I think much in his usual.” 

Because of her bulk Mrs. Dods ascended the stairs slowly, 
and she kept speaking, “He’s had a gey bit turn o’ the cauld, 
and it mak’s a body anxious.” 

“ That’s not so good ; you should not let him go out at 
night. My mother has been complaining a little too, but as 
the season advances we’ll hope they’ll improve.” 

The postman came up behind them with a letter for Miss 
Barclay, and the ladies parted — Mrs. Dods thinking, “ Her 
mother compleening ! I wonder when she does onything else. 
She’s a heavy handfu’ ; ” and Miss Barclay saying to herselfj 
“ Beally I don’t think I could have patience with Mr. Dods.” 
We don’t need to go to marine animals and the wonders of 
the shore for surprising instances of adaptation. 

Barbara had received her letter outside her own door, and 
consequently had it in her option to suppress all mention of 


104 


BLINDPITS. 


its arrival; she determined to do so. Barbara kept a good 
many things to herself; she was aware that anything her 
mother knew soon became public property. Besides, Mrs. 
Barclay would build far more on this letter than it would 
carry, and she might only he the more disappointed in her 
expectations. 

The letter contained a twenty-pound note, and on the flap 
of the envelope was written, in an antiquated style, the word 
“ Well.— B. B.” 

Barbara was very genial this evening. She was generally 
cheerful and kindly from a sense of duty, however she felt ; 
hut the relief from anxiety about Bessie, and Miss Boston’s 
gift — doubly welcome as coming from her — made her very 
happy. Bessie remarked it, and said, “ Aunt, you look as if 
you had got good news.” 

u Do I ? I have been vexed and anxious about the conduct 
of one of my pupils for some time, and I got a very satisfac- 
tory explanation about it to-day, which has entirely set my 
mind at rest.” 

“ Which of them was it, aunt ; and what had she done ? ” 

“ She hadn’t done anything, I was glad to find ; it was all a 
mistake.” Then it struck her she might show Miss Boston’s 
envelope without danger, “ And I heard from J^Iiss Boston to- 
day,” she concluded. 

Mrs. Barclay suddenly looked all attention. a And what 
does she say ? ” 

“ Just one word, hut a very satisfactory one. There is the 
letter, if you can call it a letter,” and she pointed to the mon- 
osyllable Miss Boston had written. 

“Was that all? — do you mean to say there was nothing in 
the envelope hut that ? ” asked Mrs. Barclay, excitedly. 

“ That was all she wrote,” said Barbara, growing red as she 
said it ; and I am sorry to convict her of an equivocation. 
That her mother was foolish and imprudent accounts for it, 
but does not excuse it. 

“ Not even to ask for me, when she knows all I have suf- 
fered ! I suppose she means that she’s well, poor creature ! ” 


BLINDPITS. 


105 


said Mrs. Barclay, with lofty dignity ; “ but it’s what she’s 
most interested in, to be sure.” Then, in- a business tone, 
“She must be getting imbecile; only an imbecile person would 
have sent a thing like that. And you call that satisfactory, 
Barbara ; I would set it down as a positive insult, unless she’s 
imbecile.” 

“ I don’t know,” said Miss Dobbie. “ I recollect, on one 
occasion, Miss Davie ” 

“ For my sake don’t speak of Miss Davie, when one is suf- 
ficiently annoyed already,” said Mrs. Barclay, in a tone of ex- 
asperation. 

“ I was only going to say,” pursued Miss Dobbie, meekly, 
“ that it was rather a remarkable occasion, and I considered it 
an instance in poiint ; but if you have no wish to hear it ” 

Barbara had been thinking how she could soothe Miss Dob- 
bie, but Bessie’s nimble wits came to the rescue. “ I’m very 
anxious to hear all about it, Miss Dobbie,’’ she said, “ and you’ll 
tell me to-morrow, will you ? Miss Davie must have been one 
of the best women that ever lived.” 

“ She was — she was indeed ; ” and the tears gathered in 
Miss Dobbie’s eye. 

“ It’s an easy thing to be good when people have nothing to 
vex and thwart them,” said Mrs. Barclay. 

“ If you mean that dear Miss Davie had nothing to vex or 
thwart her, you are very much mistaken, Mrs. Barclay,” said 
Miss Dobbie, mildly. 

“ Well, well ; she’s at the end of her troubles now, as I’ll 
be before long ; ” and she pointed her sentence with a deep 
sigh. 

Miss Dobbie being planted beside Mrs. Barclay was another 
instance of nice adaptation. It has been said that she had 
lived for fifty years in the world to very little purpose, and so 
it appeared to me when I first met her, but it was a rash 
judgment. Any one who has learned to subdue pride, and 
envy, and malice, and evil speaking, and to replace them with 
that charity which thinketh no evil, has not lived in vain ; nay, 
has fulfilled the very end of his being. Perhaps these vices 
5 * 


106 


BLINDPITS. 


liad never been very rampant in Miss Dobbie. I did not 
know her in earlier life, but unquestionably they w'ere there to 
develop or crush, and she had crushed them. Though in the 
trying and touchy position of poor relation, she did not think 
more highly of herself than she ought to think ; and this very 
Christmas, w'hen the invitation she had set her heart upon, to 
the family party at Dobbiestanes, never came, and all her little 
labors of love at her dress were lost, she never said a bitter 
word, but passed it over lightly, although, I daresay, in her own 
room, in the dark, she cried about it. She was not intellectu- 
ally strong, but she earned Barbara Barclay’s gratitude by the 
way she demeaned herself towards her mother. 


CHAPTER XIII. 


John Grant was a prudent young man — a really good 
type of the prudent young man of the period. He could 
hardly he accused of snobbery, yet somehow his chosen friends 
all stood, like peach-trees, on the sunny side of fortune’s wall. 
Miss Boston’s domestic accused him of meanness, hut she was 
a woman wholly devoid of the nice delicacy that prefers a good 
word or a genial smile to a palm crossed with silver, and she 
was in the habit of clothing her ideas in language strong 
rather than refined, so that her opinion goes for little. 

But there was another woman — young, good,- and generous — 
who had made him her hero. John was matrimonially en- 
gaged — prudently, it need not he said — hut he was over head 
and ears in love too, only a shallower depth effected that with 
him than in some cases. The lady had been easily courted, 
and any other youth of suitable age and prospects crossing her 
path before John would probably have been equally successful ; 
but in saying that it is not meant to undervalue her. She was 
good, very good, and time only increased her goodness. 

John, being thus situated wisely and well himself, was 
vexed that his friend Graham Richardson should land himself 
in a mess, and talked over the matter with “ Mary.” Mary 
thought the inequality in point of age a decided stumbling- 
block, but the facts that she was one of a family of ten and 
would not bring a sixpence with her, she could not see to be 
obstacles. 

“ John,” she said, *‘if papa had been poor, and I had had a 
great many brothers and sisters, you would still have loved 
ir*e, would you not ? ” 


108 


BLINDPITS. 


“ Oil, to be sure ; but there’s no use speculating on what 
might have been ; the thing is, to act wisely in present 
circumstances, and the cases are different. I have a father 
able to help me, and the certainty of a position, so that it 
wouldn’t matter though my wife had nothing ; but he has no 
one to back him, and he may or may not get a good situa- 
tion.” 

“But, John, if he were to get a good situation, would it not 
be cruel if, as you think, the lady is so fond of him, to ” — 

“ Oh, fond ! I daresaj 7 " you measure everybody by yourself, 
Mary. I shouldn’t wonder but she’s been fond of more than 
him in her day. She would recover.” 

Mary was shocked. She said, “Really, John, you know 
best. You should write to him again and say what you think. 
Poor Graham, I should be sorry he did a foolish thing.” 

And John wrote. A few mornings after, Mr. Dods carried 
three letters into Mr. Richardson’s bedchamber, and found 
him still extended in bed and fast asleep. With the 
awkwardness which is fabled to accompany genius Mr. Dods 
knocked a heavy book off the table as he laid down the letters, 
and roused his lodger, who exclaimed, “ What is it ? Is that 
you, Mr. Dods ? It’s not very late, is it ? ” The bedclothes 
were tossed as if a mighty wind had passed over them in the 
night. 

“ It’s just eight o’clock, sir.” 

“Nonsense. You don’t mean to say I’ve slept till eight 
o’clock?” 

“It’s eight o’clock, and ye’ll ken best yersel’ if ye was 
sleeping or no. There’s your letters.” 

“ See ; fling them here. I’ll read them before I rise.” 

He turned himself round and looked at his letters. “ Prom 
John,” he said to himself. “I hope he sticks to his plan of 
ignoring S. A. since that’s all over.” 

He hastily tossed the letters down, turned again and hid his 
face in the pillow, then starting up hurriedly, he dressed like a 
man with a wager depending on his speed, picked up his 
unopened letters, and ^yent to his sitting-room. 


BLINDPITS. 


109 


Mr. Dods was seated before the fire extending bis long thin 
fingers to the warmth, and looking round complacently on the 
room he had dusted and the breakfast-table he had laid ; and 
surely a poet, without detracting from the dignity of himself 
or his calling, may enjoy the consciousness of having done a 
hcusemaid’s work thoroughly. He rose when Mr. Richardson 
entered. 

“ I didna expect ye for the best part of an hour yet, but 
you’ve no let the grass grow under your feet.” 

“ Ho,” was the short answer, and Mr. Dods understood that 
in some sort his lodger was ruffled that morning, and turned 
over in his mind whether any of the letters could be the 
cause ; but when he came back with the toast he saw them on 
the table unopened. 

“ Take your seat again, Mr. Dods, if you are inclined ; 
you’ll not disturb me,” said Mr. Richardson. 

“ You’re very kind, sir.” Then, seizing the opening, 
“ That creature Pettigrew cam’ hame last night.” 

“ Yes ? ” said Graham, interrogatively. 

“ And he paid his rent, as he aye does, like clockwark, a 
month in advance ; and the wife was pleased, and asked him 
to tak’ the book, as she whiles does when she’s in the key. 
Weel, he prayed for me as if I had been Mahomet’s coffin, 
hanging atween heaven and earth ; and he left a pair o’ boots 
in the kitchen that had been in every glaur-hole on the road. 
And there’s no way o’ being even wi’ him — no way,” and Mr. 
Dods stopped, in a flutter of impotent anger. 

Though steeped in his own woes, the youth — who took his 
view of Mr. Dods from the ground opposite that from which 
Miss Barclay made her estimate of him — said soothingly, 
“It is most dignified, Mr. Dods, to take no notice of such 
as he. If you were to pay any attention to what he says it 
would only gratify him.” 

“ I daursay you’re no far wrang ; but the bile that creature 
stirs in me, no tongue o’ man can tell.” 

“ It’s not worth the while of such a man as you, Mr. Dods, 
to let yourself be irritated by him. If I were you, I would 
just shut eyes and ears to him.” 


110 


BLINDPITS. 


“ It’s easy speaking,” said Mr. Dods, emphatically ; “ it’s 
easy speaking, but you’re no done wi’ your breakfast, Mr. 
Richardson — you’ve eaten naething.” 

“ I’m done though : I can’t he bothered eating this morn- 
ing.” 

Mr. Dods removed the things quietly, and considered that 
this loss of appetite was another hint for the poem he had in 
hand ; and in musing over it, and shaking it into rhyme, he 
escaped from his Pettigrew-some worries. 

Graham drew his letters to him once more. He looked at 
the hack of them. “ Prom my mother and Miss Grant, too ; 
what can they all he writing about at once ? ” and with a 
slight feeling of curiosity he opened his mother’s first. 

“My Dear Graham, — Had the season of the year and 
my infirm health permitted, I would have been in Ironburgh 
at this time for the purpose of seeing you. Could you pos- 
sibly find time to pay me a visit ? 

“I am very anxious to have a conversation with you in 
regard to a subject of great interest to us both. In the mean- 
time, I hope you will not be tempted to do anything rashly ; 
there is a proverb which says, ‘ Marry in haste, and repent at 
leisure.’ It is my most earnest wish that this may not be 
your fate. Would it not be possible for me to make the 
acquaintance of a certain young lady I hear of, before she is 
irrevocably engaged to become my daughter-in-law ? The 
advice of a female friend is of incalculable value to a young 
man at such a crisis. Dear Graham, with anxious love, I am 
etc. etc.” 

“ Miss Grant’s note was to the same effect. The two ladies 
had traversed the matter between them ; but they had not 
arranged pointedly which was to write ; the consequence of 
which was that both wrote. 

Their young friend put down their missives with a queer 
bitter smile on his face. “ Oh, Sara, Sara ! ” he said. “ So 
you were to have been sent out on sight, like a parcel of goods, 


BLIND PITS. 


Ill 


co be returned if not approved of — a cool proposal for twc 
good women to make. Now for John’s ; I wonder if he strikes 
the same note.” 

“My Dear Graham, — You reproach me for not writing 
about S. A. I should think you would not feel particularly 
obliged for what I have said on the subject already ; however, 
if it will gratify you, I’ll harp a little more on that string. 

“When you fairly make the plunge, you’ll be immensely 
surprised at your own success ; but I won’t, that’s all. I think 
I’ve said as much before, but I’m going to put the thing in a 
different point of view this time. 

“Loving the lady as you do to distraction, do you think it 
kind or honorable to engage her to a penniless man who has 
no certainty even of a situation ? With your ideas of gener- 
osity, I wonder you could think of it for a moment. No, no, 
Graham ; don’t engage yourself till you have a home to bring 
her to, and an income sufficient to make her comfortable. I 
talked it over with Mary last night, and she advised me to 
write to you; perhaps her word may go farther than mine. 
M’ Vicar has been laid up with cold, and I have been attend- 
ing his patients for the last week. I am, yours truly, 

John Grant.” 

Graham crushed these letters into his pocket, and went 
about his daily business. On coming home at night he wrote 
to John Grant. 

“ Dear John, — You still think S. A. will jump at me ; and 
you talked it over with Mary. Did you talk as irreverently 
of women to her ? Take care she doesn’t quarrel with you. 
Well; your wisdom is at fault for once. As you express it, I 
made ‘ the plunge’ last night. She was kind and very deli- 
cate ; but all hope is over for me. I had hoped against hope — 
there — I’ll not say anything more of myself. My mother and 
Miss Grant have both written to me ; they are good women, 
but they forgot the dignity of their sex strangely ; they want 


112 


BLINDPITS. 


Miss A. sent for their inspection before she shall he offered the 
stupendous honor of marrying me. Jack, I could almost laugh 
and greet together. My idea of a lady is, that she will not, 
unsought be won — fruit ready to drop into the mouth, if such 
there be, I couldn’t relish ; hut my notions may he old- 
fashioned. It is very lonely here these long nights. I cannot 
go to the Andersons’ now. Sara leaves for India shortly with 
her husband ; and I don’t know many people, and don’t care 
to. I hear the piano in the next house : if I were an enthu- 
siast in music, I would find my way often there. I told you 
of the young girl and old ladies who live there, and I’ll go oc- 
casionally — a man is made to fight with disappointment. I 
shall write to Mrs. Richardson and Miss Grant, and put an end 
to their anxiety about me ; they will be glad likely, for they 
cannot know what I have lost. If we were busy at the office 
just now I would stay there all the evening ; but we are not. 
How do you like being rung out of bed in the middle of the 
night ? Remember me to Mary ; I am grateful for the 
interest she takes in me. — I am,” etc. etc. 

John read this letter to his aunt and father. 

“ Aunt,” he said when he had done ; “ you’re in his black 
books as well as me.” 

“ Well, John, now that he puts the thing in that light, it 
was rather a curious proposal to make ; but his mother and I 
were so anxious about him.” 

“And justly,” said John. “My notion of the lady is 
borne out — she had kept him dangling till she got the other 
fellow brought up to the point.” 

“ John,” said his father,” you have stumbled into the wrong 
profession ; you should have been a lawyer.” 

“ I think,” said Miss Grant, “ you have hardly a right to 
say that of the lady — she couldn’t help Graham running after 
her.” 

“ Couldn’t she ? ” said John. 

“ Ho ; I don’t think she could,” said Mr. Grant, “ and long 
may Graham keep his high ideal of women.” 


BLINDPITS. 


113 


11 The ideal is all well enough/’ rejoined John, tc only he 
thinks every woman he sees an impersonation of it. These 
people next door to him that I’ve heard him speak of, one of 
them will be his next ideal ; the niece, or as he has a taste 
for old ladies, more probably the aunt ; you’ll see. In fact, he 
had better, perhaps, have got Miss Anderson and been done 
with it, who knows ? ” 

“ Who knows, indeed ? ” said Mr. Grant, “ but if I know 
Graham, it will be a time, at least, before he is ready to wor- 
ship a new goddess.” 

“ Poor fellow,” said Miss Grant, “ I’m sorry for him ; it is 
a dreary thing for a boy to be alone in lodgings.” 

“Very,” said Mr. Grant, as he was leaving the room, and 
there was more in his tone than assent ; there was sympathy 
— he was thinking, perhaps, that it was a dreary thing for a 
man to be alone in his own house. True, he was not actually 
alone ; had he not his sister and his son ? Miss Grant was a 
good woman, who both loved and respected her brother, as he 
did her, and yet there was no very close intercourse between 
them. It is not uncommon for good people to live together in 
the same house without blending. It would have been unnat- 
ural if he had not been fond of, and proud of, his son, as his 
son was of him ; but neither did they blend. ITe never 
acknowledged the idea to himself ; however, if Graham Rich- 
ardson had been his son, and John his step-nej&ew, it may be 
averred he would have been better suited. If it was a wicked 
thing for Mr. Grant to feel, occasionally, as if he wanted some 
other companionship while he had these near relatives beside 
him, then he was wicked ; for there were times when he did 
so feel. He did not believe he could ever fall in love — he was 
past that sort of thing — but he had thought of marrying in a 
quiet judicious way; only he had never seen the woman he 
could offer even that style of matrimony to. He must have 
been difficult to please, for ladies were not scarce in the 
county, and Mr. Grant had a wide acquaintance. Mrs. Gas- 
coigne, for instance — she was a lady equal to any position ; 
and whether Mr. Grant surmised it or not, the public of 


114 


BLINDPITS. 


Heatherburgli were not slow to say that she looked upon the 
vacant Mrs. Grantship with anything hut contempt. They 
had known each other long, and Mrs. Gascoigne had grown 
confidential in confabs anent “ dear Mary ” and J ohn, and had 
even related to Mr. Grant the circumstances of her husband’s 
death and funeral, with tears coming and going at the right 
places, and in quantity not to disfigure the fair face of the 
widow — they had exactly the effect on him that a painted fire 
would have had ; and he left, saying to himself, “ Preserve 
me from being 1 poor dear Grant/ although she would be sure 
of the Marquis at my funeral, I think.” The widow was a 
sharp, clever, clear-sighted woman, hut there was a hard 
business-ring about both her matter and manner. Yet she 
was not heartless ; only when a grief has been taken out and 
exhibited to every acquaintance for a term of twenty years, 
it becomes, even to its possessor, like an old coin worn smooth 
by friction, however deep and well-defined the die may have 
been originally. 

Then there was Mrs. Dyce, a very young gentle widow, who 
had lost a husband and two children at a stroke by fever, and 
who seemed ready to twine her tendrils round any strong sup- 
port that might he near ; hut neither did the melting style 
suit Mr. Grant : and there was Miss Proudfoot, who gener- 
ally lived at Edenside with her brother-in-law and sister, Mr. 
and Mrs. Ainslie of that ilk ; these were neighbors, and if 
Mr. Grant chanced to look in there, he was as sure of his din- 
ner as if he had gone to a hotel and ordered it. They were 
new people, and Miss Boston said " it would take generations 
before they could be licked into gentlefolks, and long before 
that, there would be a scail among the siller.” Miss Boston, 
as became the last of the Bostons of Bostonfield, 

“ Shunned on every side 
The splash of newly-mounted pride.” 

But the Ainslies and other settlers of a like order went on 
their way rejoicing notwithstanding ; and seeing she was a 
lady, left their cards at her door — they never got farther — 
although immensely tickled at her ways and oddity. 


BLINDPITS. 


115 


Of course the Marquis and Marchioness of Heatherdale, and 
the young Lords and Ladies Heatherdale, looked on Mr. Grant 
as a faithful and valuable dependant, and slumped the small 
fry in and around Heatherburgh as being undistinguishable 
as layers of society; and when they caught an inkling of the 
fact that one Heatherburgh star considered itself to differ, 
very decidedly indeed, from another Heatherburgh star in 
glory, it struck them as an eminently good joke — probably 
angels flying about think pride in the Heatherdale family as 
good as a joke, if angels have a sense of humor, and the heart 
to laugh at what goes on in such a world as ours. 

And as for the brilliant idea, conceived by Miss Dobbie, of 
uniting the family fortunes by espousing Barbara Barclay, 
that had never crossed the remotest corner of Mr. Grant’s 
brain. It had glanced across Miss Boston, we know, and she 
had sung Barbara’s praises ; she was the best of nurses ; but 
w hat had Mr. Grant to do with nurses ? And it is vexatious 
to know that he had described her to his sister in terms that 
admitted of no hope ; he had answered Miss Grant’s inquiries 
respecting her by saying that “ she was a fat sensible-looking 
person.” Hot that fat ladies are never married; only their 
admirers don’t use such blunt expressions. How, it is not to 
be denied that she was a little stout, but, to my eyes, she 
always looked well ; and the reader may take my word for it 
that adjectives “ fat” and u greasy,” applied to her by Mr. Grant 
and Dr. M‘Vicar, are quite out of the question; the men’s 
eyes must have been holden that they did not see. Tastes 
differ, it is true ; but when a woman gets past the bloom of 
youth, is she not the better of a little embonpoint? Certainly 
it is much preferable to the stick automaton-like effect of 
gaunt leanness. But it is absurd in me to be apologising for 
Miss Barclay’s appearance ; she was a serene, pretty-looking 
woman — fat or not fat. It was surprising she did not go to 
the extreme of leanness, considering the amount of work she 
did and her little wearing anxieties. 

Her anxiety about the acquaintance that had sprung up 
between Bessie and Mr. Richardson having been completely 


116 


BLINDPITS. 


set at rest, she resumed her ordinary courteous hearing both 
towards him and Mr. Dods. It was very unlike her, ever to 
have dropped it ; but as a hen will do much in defence of her 
chickens, even a governess may be excused if she forgets the 
proprieties so far on behalf of a niece. She made it up to 
Graham, by encouraging his visits and getting to like him. 
It was difficult not to like him when you knew him ; though, 
at first, appearances were rather against him. He was very 
tall, and what Mrs. Dods called “ ill hung thegither ; ” but in 
the course of a year or two he gave promise of improving, 
possibly of even being good-looking. He liked Miss Barclay ; 
liked her sweet face, her sturdy figure, and her equally sturdy 
common sense, and liked and respected her laborious life. He 
wa"s amused with the other inmates. He did not blame him- 
self for being amused at Bessie’s expense, but he was doubtful 
of the propriety of getting amusement out of the two old 
ladies ; only he couldn’t help it. 


CHAPTER, XIV. 


The evenings that Graham Richardson had ere while spent 
in questionable bliss beside the beloved Sara, he now spent in 
the calm, quiet atmosphere of Mrs. Barclay’s little sitting- 
room. If there were no eyes to watch for a glance that would 
send him into the seventh heaven, neither could he get any 
sudden tumble into the mud of despair. That celestial sick- 
ening see-saw was over, not to be recalled. 

If Miss Barclay could have known this she would again 
have set herself to climb the hill Difficulty. Happily for her 
peace of mind she did not know it. To have encouraged his 
visits for the purpose of keeping him out of mischief, at the 
slightest risk to her one ewe lamb, was a stretch of pure 
philanthropy of which she -was not capable, but she performed 
the good deed unconsciously. 

Graham was very soon at home, and acted the elder brother 
to Bessie, with much pleasure to himself and profit to her, and 
even satisfaction to Miss Barclay, who began to think him a 
valuable auxiliary, for he supported her views in respect to 
the impropriety of Bessie attempting to become a public 
character. 

“ But, aunt,” said Bessie ; “ what am I to do ? Just point 
out how I am to make money. I don’t mean a few guineas a 
quarter by teaching music, but money to make us comforta- 
ble.” 

“ Are we uncomfortable, Mr. Richardson, do you think ? ” 
said Barbara. 


118 


BLIXDPITS. 


“ I think not. I’m very comfortable here at any rate ; and 
I think, Bessie, I once said to you that if I had sisters I would 
not allow them to appear in public.” 

“ But I am not your sister ; and, although I were, I don’t 
know that you would have any right to prevent me doing as I 
wished. I might as well dictate to you.” 

“Perhaps ‘allow’ was too strong a word. We would have 
advised each other.” 

“ And you would have taken my advice ? ” 

“ I would at least have given it my best consideration.” 

“ Would you take my advice as it is now?” 

“Bessie,” said her aunt, “What possible advice can you 
have to give to Mr. Richardson ? ” 

“ I would advise him to he a tailor ; it is a quiet useful em- 
ployment, and if he is always busy with his needle he will he 
out of harm’s way. Law} r ers are a had set, and gentlemen’s 
factors — if that’s what he means to be — always toady the 
great and oppress the poor. I have met them often enough to 
know them.” 

“ Where ? ” said Graham, innocently. 

“In hooks — scores of them; and they are always ejecting 
virtuous tenants, or worse.” 

“ Ah ! hut you mustn’t take your notions from hooks alto- 
gether. I have an uncle a factor, and a better man never 
lived. To he sure there are wicked lawyers, as there are 
wicked clergymen and doctors; hut I am not aware that 
tailors are generally better than other people.” 

“ And are you aware that women who slave in a small pri- 
vate way are better than those who try public life ? ” 

“ Appearing in public makes a woman bold and brassy.” 

“ Don’t say bold and brassy ; say, active and energetic ; not 
so agreeable, perhaps, but I wouldn’t mind that; and more 
able to make something of this life ; and for the next, I think 
an active energetic angei will be as much to the purpose as 
one only accustomed to the use of her needle.” 

“Really, Bessie,” said her aunt, “I’m surprised at you. 


BLINDPITS. 


119 


Among all the odd scraps of rhyme you pick up, don’t you 
remember the verse which says — 

“The trivial round, the common task 
Shall furnish all we ought to ask — 

Room to deny ourselves, a road 
To bring us, daily, nearer God.” 

“ I remember well enough, hut ” 

“ But, Miss Barclay, Bessie has a soul above buttons and 
needles and pins,” said Graham. 

“ No, I haven’t ; I don’t pretend to like sewing, hut I can 
do it. It’s not the publicity I like — I don’t like it — it’s the 
profitable employment.” 

“But Bessie, my dear, an employment may he profitable in 
one sense and very unprofitable in another.” 

“Well, well, auntie,” said she, resignedly. “I have long 
thought over the thing, and I don’t see it as you see it, but 
I’ll give up my plan.” 

“That’s right,” said Graham. “You’ll not regret it, I 
think.” 

“ I’ll not promise that. I am getting old, and I have done 
nothing yet ; to-morrow is my birthday, and I shall be seven- 
teen — very old. 

“ ‘ Even such is time, that takes on trust 
Our youth, our joys, our all we have, 

And pays us but in age and dust ’ ” 

Graham hurst out laughing, and Bessie’s face grew red, and 
he apologized in a lame way by saying he couldn’t help it, it 
was so ridiculous to hear her speak of time having taken her 
youth and joys. 

“ Well, I often feel old ; as old as the hills.” 

“That’s because your time is not fully and usefully filled 
up, Bessie,” said Miss Barclay ; “ I must see to that. Your 
music pupils, who come on Monday, will help so far; and I 
have some white-seam I have not been able to overtake, I’ll 
give you it to do ; and you must get some good work in history 
to study carefully ; and I think you ought to try cooking, a 


120 


BLINDPITS. 


knowledge of cooking is always valuable to a woman, and then 
you’ll have no time for vague fancies.” 

“Very well; I’ll do the sewing. I would like to grow use- 
ful and industrious, and I’ll read any amount of history — 
that’ll he no punishment ; and the cooking will be delightful. 
I am so fond of experiments, and the combinations one can 
try are almost endless. If Mr. Dods had thrown his imagi- 
nation into his business, I think he would have liked it.” 

“ If he had thrown his attention into it, Bessie, it would have 
been more to the purpose, and you must not begin experi- 
menting on our poor little dinners; inventions and experi- 
ments are ruinous : you must only learn what has been done 
before, and if you do that, I’ll think you have done very well.” 

“There, Bessie,” said Graham, “your wings are clipped 
again you see. You must bring your mind down to be a good 
plain cook ; but then, perhaps, your youth and joys may be 
buried in a pasty, or smothered in a pudding.” 

“ She will be more likely to exhume them, Mr. Bichardson,” 
said Miss Barclay ; “ at least I — and I can’t suppose myself 
singular — have always felt an amount of satisfaction in putting 
a piece of work, whatever it was, out of my hands well done — 
that amply repaid me for the trouble I had taken.” 

“ But, auntie, I’m not like you. I never do anything well 
enough to be satisfied with it.” 

“ But you can’t expect to do things well at first, my dear. 
Borne was not built in a day.” 

“ Of course not,” said Graham. “ Come, Bessie, play a lit- 
tle before I go.” 

As she went to the old fifth-rate piano and touched it with 
the hand of a born musician, a vision came over him of the 
Andersons’ large well-lighted drawing-room, filled with a flock 
of animated young people all in a flutter of light-hearted 
gaiety, and it did occur to him that, after all, Bessie’s youth 
and joys had not much sea-room. She was in a quiet enough 
bay, it is true, but if it was sheltered from wind it was also 
sheltered from sun. It was well enough for an hour or two 
now and then of an evening ; but to be shut in always with 
these two old women was different. 


BLINDPITS. 


121 


As he stood behind her, he said, “ Bessie, you could easily 
make your way in public, hut I wouldn’t like to see you do 
it.” 

“ Wouldn’t you ? Very well ; you \yill not. I have given 
up the idea, and I’m not going to worry any more about it. I 
am very sorry though, hut aunt knows best. I begin to creep 
privately on Monday. The Misses Eraser then enter on their 
musical education under my superintendence.” 

“ Fraser ! the provision-man at the end of the street ? ” 

“His daughters. Their mother wishes them to get some 
quarters at the music, to finish their education. When I saw 
her the other day she spoke of her watch as if it were a little 
girl. She said, Did I know what o’clock it was, for she had 
run out before she noticed her, and she had sent her to the 
watch-maker’s, and she had not come hack. She patronises 
aunt. Aunt,” Bessie said, raising her voice, “ I was telling 
Mr. Richardson how well you and Mrs. Fraser suit each 
other.” 

“ Mrs. Fraser is a very excellent woman in her way, Bessie, 
and means well. One does not expect the same delicacy of 
feeling in all ranks of life, not that delicacy of feeling depends 
on rank either ; still training and circumstances do much to 
disguise the want of it. But we are not called upon to make 
an intimate friend of Mrs. Fraser.” 

“ Of course not,” said Miss Dobbie ; “ hut it appears to me 
she is very anxious to push herself into good society. You 
know I have been once or twice in the shop ordering things, 
and she makes a point of bowing to me when I see her.” 

“ You don’t say so ? ” cried Bessie. “ What shall we do ? 
When the fat young ladies come, I must be the stern mistress , 
our intercourse must be strictly official,” 

“ Such people don’t understand hints, Bessie,” said grand- 
mamma ; “ it is very mortifying to be compelled to have any- 
thing to do with them.” 

Yes ; Graham began to think that Bessie Barclay was 
not very happily situated. He thought of her, and he pitied 
her; but mark he did not fall in love with her, that (owing to 
6 


122 


BLINDPITS. 


circumstances related) was impossible ; but he crept into it, or 
rather it crept into him — far in — and ensc onced itself cosily 
like a cat that has slipped into your room, and coiled itself 
among shawls, and you only know its presence when it begins 
to cry u mew ” in the middle of the night ; or like a charge of 
gunpowder in a hole of the rock, quietly waiting the match 
which is to kindle it into instant life, and make, oh, ever 
a to-do ! 

But Bessie was by no means a pitiable object. In esti- 
mating her position, Graham was like the gentlemen who 
recommend the poor to expend their penny on skimmed milk 
rather than tea, the one being proved by analysis to be so 
much more nutritious than the other — he left out an element 
in his calculations. Bessie loved her aunt Barbara with a 
very perfect love ; she loved her grandmamma ; and Miss 
Dobbie, too, came in for a share of her love — here was the 
subtle stimulus, the warmth which analysis does not reach, 
but which makes all the difference between happiness and un- 
happiness. 


CHAPTER XV. 


“ Have yon seen the new number of the Ironburgh Maga- 
zine f ” said Mr. Pettigrew, addressing the question apparently 
to the three pairs and a half of candlesticks, his eyes being fixed 
on them at the moment, and his back sunning itself in front 
of the comfortable fire which always flourished in his land- 
lady’s kitchen of an evening. 

Mrs. Dods, of late, often sat down after the labors of the 
day were over, hand idle. She had never been accustomed to 
idleness. If she had cultivated it a little in her youth, it 
might have been a resource to her now in her advancing years. 
Mrs. Barclay could sit by the hour and enjoy herself doing 
nothing ; however, it was thrust on her now in some degree — 
at night she could not see to sew, and not being of a studious 
habit, she did not care to read much, so that it is not astonish- 
ing if she fell upon sleep pretty frequently. At the moment 
when Mr. Pettigrew propounded his question, she was sitting 
with her arms laid over each other across her waist — if she 
could be said to have a waist — and her head bent forward on 
her breast, till her nose seemed absorbed in the pillowy 
expanse, reminding you of a fowl that tucks its beak among 
its feathers for the night. Evidently she treated Mr. Petti- 
grew as one of the family. Mr. Dods was sitting beside the 
gas, reading and ignoring his lodger’s presence entirely. That 
did not matter to the lodger, who was looking at him, and 
determined to get to the bottom of the big envelope and its 
contents. 

“ There is a poem in it by a new hand.” Here Mr. Dods, 


124 


BLINDPITS. 


who had watched the forthcoming numbers of the Magazine 
— as the followers of Zoroaster watch the heavenly bodies — 
for many months, and had only slackened his vigils from the 
sickness of hope long deferred, could not hinder himself giving 
a hitch in his chair, indicating that the arrow had gone home. 
“ By a new hand,” repeated the tormentor slowly, “ which 
they tell me is exciting attention.” Mr. Dods moved rest- 
lessly again, and his lips moved, but he had still the presence 
of mind not to speak. 

“ Gudeman, will it be ane o’ yours at last ? ” said Mrs. 
Dods suddenly. 

“ I doubt I’ve wakened you, Mrs. Dods,” said Mr. Petti- 
grew. 

“Wakened, Peter? Pm no aye sleepin’ when I’m winkin’.” 

“ One of yours, Mr. Dods,” repeated Mr. Pettigrew in a 
confidential between-you-and-me style, “ Ay ! you write for 
the Ironburgh Magazine : well, it is dated Ironburgh, and 
signed T. D. ; but were yours not all returned — you mind a 
big letter I took in one morning ? ” 

Mr. Dods could play the stoic no longer : he rose, grasped 
Pettigrew’s arm excitedly, and said, “ I sent them back — the 
title — what’s the title ? ” His head, projected forward at the 
end of his long lean neck, trembled with eagerness like a 
snowdrop in the wind, his eye gleamed, and the color rose in 
his faded cheeks. 

“ The title ? If I remember, it is called the ‘ Alps TJnvis- 
ited.’ Did I say it was signed T. D.? If I did, it was a 
mistake ; now, I think, the initials were D. V.” 

“ D. V.,” muttered the unhappy Mr. Dods, “ D. V. ! I 
would kick you out o’ this house, and would think I was doing 
baith Him and mysel’ service.” 

He sat down, feeling as if he had been stunned or shaken 
by some accident. He craned his neck forward and bent over 
his book, but not a word did he see ; his head swam, and his 
ears buzzed. 

Mr. Pettigrew, of course, had no idea of his own cruelty. 
He was not an author, and as Mrs. Dods sometimes declared 


BLINDPITS. 


125 


lie could “ spier the heart oot o’ a hurlbarrow.” It was a 
small thing to practise on the old man. Mrs. Dods was not 
an author either, and what could either of them know of the 
tenderness of the parent — why, the tenderness of the author 
towards his offspring might he a caution to many parents, I 
fancy, both before and since the time when Csesar swam ashore 
holding his Commentaries in his left hand above water — what 
could they know then of the tenderness of the parent, the 
vanity of the man, the noble ambition of the poet ? Nothing! 
Consequently they pursued their talk, leaving the wounded 
creature beside them to recover the effects of the scalping- 
knife as he best might. 

“ And so,” said Mr. Pettigrew, “ Mrs. Eraser is sending her 
daughters to Miss Betsy to learn to play the piano ? ” 

a And muckle Bessie’ll mak’ o’ them. Their fingers are mair 
at hame baking for the shop than playing on a piano ; but the 
mother is a senseless body, no to speak o’ the faither — the 
sense for scraping a pickle siller thegither is geyan often dis- 
tinct frae other kinds o’ sense. You’ve been lang enough in 
the world to notice that, Peter ? ” 

u I can’t say that I have, Mrs. Dods. I respect the man 
that has made siller. You would not hinder folk rising in the 
world, would you ? ” 

“ Folk’ll no rise to muckle purpose by makin’ themselves 
ridiculous; but they are strong, wiselike lassies. I think I 
see them at it aside that fairy Bessie. Weel, I mind their 
grandfaither, auld Johnnie Fraser the cadger, he cam round 
by my fai tiler’s place every Wednesday. I can see his cart 
creepin’ at the burnside on a simmer afternoon, him lyin’ on’t 
half sleepin’ — the beast kent the road as weel as him ; it was 
a sin to sleep in sic a place, for oh ! it was bonnie ; the quiet 
quiet hills touching the blue, and speckled wi’ sheep, nae noise 
but the singing burn and the hum o’ the wild bee, or the whir 
o’ the muirfowl, a mile or twa atween ilka house and nae reek 
— think o’ a place in nae reek, or dirt, or din, and nae smell 
but the wild thyme and the caller air. Weel, Johnnie was a 
pawky body ; he was carr-handed, and I mind he had a mant, 


12 t> 


BLINDP1TS. 


but brawly be kenn’d bow to buy and sell ; I think he would 
look up if he heard o’ his grand-daughters playing the piano.” 

“ And be gratified ; I dinna doubt be gratified/’ said the 
wounded man unexpectedly. 

“ Weel, Tammas Dods, I kenn’d him just about as weel as 
I ken you, and I’ll tell ye what he would hae said, just as 
if I had heard him say it ; he would hae said, 1 A fule and his 
siller is soon parted.’ ” 

"Weel, weel, gudewife, there’s nae use speaking; ye just 
say what suits yersel’ ; it’s no twa minutes since I heard ye 
say folk scrapit siller better thegither without sense o’ a kind, 
which opinion I homologated in my ain mind, and now ye’re 
saying the clean contrary.” 

Mrs. Dods, of course, went on to show that she was right 
and consistent, and Mr. Dods resumed his usual silence. 

“ Miss Barclay is likely to rise in the world before long,” 
said Mr. Pettigrew, prolonging his call on his landlady an un- 
reasonable time, but willing to pay for his accommodation in 
the coin of news. u The old lady she was with at Christmas 
is wealthy, and more than that, she sent her a twenty-pound 
note in a letter not long since ; not bad wages for a fortnight’s 
work ? ” 

“ Better than preaching,” cried Mrs. Dods ; “ but, preserve 
me, Peter, how do ye come to ken the like o’ that ? did she 
tell ye?” 

“ It is a fact, however I came to know it,” said Pettigrew 
importantly. 

“ If she tell’t ye, ye man be gey far ben wi’ her.” 

“ Not a bad specnlation ; eh, Mrs. Dods ? ” and Mr. P. 
chuckled. 

" Weel, Peter, if ye want my opinion — although ye’ll never 
say what folk will do in that way — yet I think we’ll hae a fa’ 
o’ blue snaw the day Miss Barclay marries you. I’m no a 
witch for a guesser either.” 

“ I don’t see, Mrs. Dods — ” 

“ Na, ye dinna see, and it doesna signify ; if ye get a sneck 
afore your nose, it’ll no break your heart.” 


BLINDPITS. 


127 


“ I don’t see, Mrs. Dods, that you have the slightest 
grounds for your opinion — ” 

“ Ye’ll see when the time comes.” 

“ The time may never come ; I haven’t made up my mind 
at all yet ; I’m perhaps better without her.” 

“ Haud to that notion, Peter, and dinna throw yersel’ 
away.” 

Peter retired to his own apartment to meditate on the 
opinion Mrs. Dods had so frankly expressed ; very extraordi- 
nary it seemed to him ; and concluded that it was dictated by 
self-interest : if he married, Mrs. Dods would lose a good 
lodger. This was as plain to Peter’s mind as a pike-staff. 
Mr. Dods expressed his surprise to his wife that she kept on 
Pettigrew as a lodger. 

“ What ails ye at him, gudeman ? he aye pays his rent, and 
gies little fash ; to he sure it’s but sma’ in consideration o’ 
that, but it helps to pay my rent ; and that’s mair than a’ the 
folks in this house do.” 

Silence again for Mr. Dods. 

Next day, it chanced that Mrs. Dods went into Mrs. Bar- 
clay’s house on a trifling errand ; and Mrs. Barclay, being 
alone, had detained her for the sake of company, and relieved 
herself by detailing her afflictions and grievances. Mrs. Dods, 
tired of the theme, got up, and just as she was shaking hands 
said, “ But I’m glad to hear of Miss Barclay’s good fortune.” 

“ Good fortune ! ” echoed Mrs. Barclay ; “ w r hat good for- 
tune ? ” 

“Mr. Pettigrew tells me that the leddy she was wi’ at 
Christmas is to leave her her siller, and sent her twenty 
pounds in a letter the other day.” 

“ That’s not true,” said Mrs. Barclay ; “ I never heard of 
it.” 

“ I warrant somebody tell’t Peter, for, to do him justice, he 
never tells lees.” 

Mrs. Barclay turned over the intelligence in every possible 
form, but surely it could not be true ? Barbara would never 
get a sum like that, especially from Miss Boston, and not men- 


128 


BLINDPITS. 


tion it ; so far as she knew, there had only been one communi- 
cation from Miss Boston, and she remembered asking Barbara, 
if the word u well ” was all that was in the letter, and Bar- 
bara had said “ yes ; ” if twenty pounds had come, it must 
have been since, and out of her knowledge ; hut she would 
soon he at the bottom of it. Bull of the subject, and prepared 
with an animated tirade against Pettigrew, who must, she was 
convinced, have made the story to increase his importance by 
making people suppose he was very intimate with them, she sat 
in her easy chair, playing with her rings, till Barbara should 
make her appearance. Mrs. Barclay had of course, imparted 
the absurd story to Miss Dobbie and Bessie, and they were 
lost in wonder how it should ever have entered Mr. Pettigrew’s 
head to make it ; for, whatever his faults and foibles might be, 
they had always given him credit for sticking to the truth. 
Miss Dobbie recalled an appropriate saying of Miss Davie’s, 
to the effect that he who tells a lie for a purpose is a knave, 
and he who tells a lie for no purpose is a fool. Bessie had no 
hesitation in setting down Mr. Pettigrew in the latter cate- 
gory ; grandmamma stuck to the idea that his motive was to 
increase his own consequence. 

At length Barbara came in with her little customary offer- 
ing for the tea-table, which she had barely time to lay down, 
when her mother said, “ Barbara, did Miss Boston ever send 
you a twenty-pound note ? ” 

A sudden warmth flashed into Barbara’s face, and she said, 
“ Why do you ask ? 99 

“ Because I have been told that she did, and I wish to know 
if it’s true.” 

“ Who told you ? ” 

“ Ay, who told me ? ” said Mrs. Barclay, beginning to think 
Mr. Pettigrew’s information correct. 11 1 could not have 
believed that you would have concealed such a thing ; but one 
never knows what is to cause one’s next pang. To think that 
my own daughter” — she went on, gathering volume as she 
heard no denial of the fact — “ that my own daughter would 
deceive me ! Pleasant things don’t happen so often in this 


BLINDPITS. 


129 


house that they should be carefully hidden. Bad news you 
can afford to share ; but good, it seems, you must keep for 
your own private enjoyment ; but I might have known it — I 
might have known it. Bessie, my dear,” in a tone as if Bes- 
sie were now the one solitary reed left her to lean on ; “ Bes- 
sie, my dear, give me my handkerchief — I left it on the sofa. 
That I should have lived to see this day ! ” then a sigh, mean- 
ing everything that words could not convey. 

“ Mrs. Barclay,” Miss Dobbie began, 11 very likely Miss 
Barclay had reasons for the course she pursued ; there are 
occasions which ” — 

“ Don’t tell me about occasions, Miss Dobbie ; nothing 
oould justify it. And the next thing will be that odious 
Pettigrew will be coming in here as master of the house” — 

“ Mother ! ” exclaimed Barbara. 

“ But, Barbara, I distinctly give you notice that, when that 
man comes here, I go to the poorhouse. There, at least” — 

“ Mother, mother, stop!” said Barbara. “Why do you 
speak of Pettigrew ? How did he occur to you just now ? ” 

A sigh heard from the depths was the answer. 

“ It’s not altogether so unnatural,” said Miss Dobbie, “ on 
the part of your mother. I’ve known people suppose things 
with less reason” — 

“ Pettigrew told her, Aunt Barbara, told her about the 
twenty pounds ; at least he told Mrs. DodS, and she grand- 
mamma.” 

“ By wPat possibility could he come to know ? Mother, I 
told no one ; and if you will listen, I will state the reason that 
influenced me in concealing the gift from you. It was simply 
to save you disappointment. You have all along been 
impressed with the idea that Miss Boston will leave us her 
money ; and I thought if I communicated her kindness to 
you, you would at once be confirmed in your previous 
opinion.” 

Let me be thankful that I have such a prudent daugh- 
ter!” 

“I knew,” said Miss Dobbie. innocent of detecting the 
6 * 


130 


BLINDPITS. 


flavor of irony, (t that Miss Barclay had a good reason for 
what she did — she always has.” 

“ I hope all her reasons may appear as good after I am in 
my grave,” said Mrs. Barclay, in solemn tones. 

Thus was Barbara’s little evil deed dragged into the light 
of day, by what means she never knew until the time came 
when her very life hung on the circumstances. She puzzled 
herself to think how Mr. Pettigrew knew. It was in the last 
degree unlikely that Miss Boston had told any one. How, 
then was it known ? This was the way it was known. Miss 
Boston gave her letter to her servant to send to the post-office. 
Bell was curious to know on what terms her mistress and Miss 
Barclay stood, and generally to see what was in the letter. 
A little gum was the only harrier between her and the infor- 
mation she craved, consequently she got it ; and, being visited 
by her clerical cousin shortly after, he wormed the fact out of 
her. 

Mrs. Barclay did not soon forget that she had what Mrs. 
Bods would have called a hair in Barbara’s neck. If all 
derelictions from the path of duty were as soon followed by as 
thorough a Nemesis, perhaps we should have a better world. 
The deceit and the cruelty of Barbara’s conduct in the matter 
of bliss Boston’s letter never came wrong as an illustration of 
Mrs. Barclay’s trials and afflictions ; and it was all the more 
useful that it wa? a real and tangible grievance. 


CHAPTER XVI. 


It was a long dreary winter, with no spring, at least no 
spring at the time the almanac said spring should be. A con- 
stant succession of high winds drove sheets of rain before 
them, varied by an occasional day or two of black frost, keen 
and dry in the country, but heavy and hoary in Ironburgh, 
making the atmosphere dense and raw, and where there was 
an iron gate — and they occur frequently in Ironburgh — crust- 
ing it over with ice so beautifully wrought that you must stop 
to gaze at it. It might drive a confectioner mad ; he might 
make his work whiter, but how attain that perfection of 
design and execution? 

But it is cold — but it is bleak. If you have any weakness 
of lungs, or bronchia, or bones, now is the time when it will 
be effectually searched out. Better wind and rain than be 
compelled to swallow this chill raw mixture of frost and 
smoke. You have it. It blows fresh during the night — 
slates fly about, chimney-pots topple over and crash on the 
pavement — a staccato accompaniment to the loud roar of the 
wind. Daylight shows the slanting sheets of rain again pur- 
suing their way across town and country. 

Much has been said and sung in praise of poverty ; and on 
a long summer day, when the sun and the lark are shining 
and singing in the heavens, a scanty garment, a light purse, 
and a homeless head, may possibly, in certain moods, be envied 
— in a song at any rate ; but in a winter day at Ironburgh, 
poverty is at its grimmest. But we have nothing to do with 
squalor; the Barclays got sufficient food and clothing, and had 


132 


BLINDPITS. 


a roof over their heads. Their house, you know, was a small 
flat, with rooms, as Miss Barclay said, the size of closets. 
The walls were thin ; and in the house, on one side, was a 
piano, of the possible value of thirty shillings, on ’which a 
young lady practised what was called music with exemplary 
diligence, and the Barclays had the full benefit of her exer- 
tions. The twin of this musical instrument was in the house 
below, and also a baby. These made themselves heard even 
amid the roar of the tempest. Only on the Dods ? side of the 
building was there perfect peace, broken merely by the poking 
of fires ; but that was a cheerful and friendly sound. All 
that would have been nothing, but, as you have seen, the 
household was a divided one. If common calamity had made 
common cause, poverty would have mattered the less ; but 
Mrs. Barclay made that impossible. Then she had nothing to 
do, or at least did nothing, which is a deplorable thing ; while 
Miss Barclay was overworked, which is not nearly so deplora- 
ble. Owing to the weather, it was rarely that Mrs. Barclay 
or Miss Dobbie went out ; on the other hand, Miss Barclay 
went out every day, defying wind and rain. When they were 
all indoors, they must needs keep each other company — 
another fire was not to be thought of. 

These things, and others put together, told on the tempers 
of the ladies. Mrs. Barclay grew more and more unreasona- 
ble ; Miss Dobbie sometimes had not such a lively sense of her 
mercies as she once had ; Miss Barclay, of course, never gave 
way to temper, but she waxed very teeth ily virtuous. Even 
Bessie, who lived in a dream and book world of her own, felt 
the sad influence of the hour, and wailed the limited income 
which her grandmamma instructed her was at the root 
of all their worries. Very likely, a little more money would 
have smoothed matters somewhat, would have oiled the 
machinery, and lessened the daily strain and creak. The 
plight of a toad embedded in a rock seems about as wretched 
as could be ; but it would be a deeper shade of wretchedness 
if several were shut in, with room to stir and no more. They 
would not be found peacefully asleep at the end of a hundred 
years, it is to be supposed. 


BLINDPITS. 


133 


Miss Dobbie was the first to have a reviving and mollifying 
influence shed upon her. Winter was gone, and spring had 
only looked in to leave a P. P. C. card and vanish to make 
room for summer, when, one fine sunny morning, when she 
was not thinking of it at all, Miss Dobbie got a letter. It was 
not often that Miss Dobbie could be surprised with a letter, 
though, like all people whose correspondence is extremely 
sporadic, she was in a cbnstant state of expectancy regarding 
it. 

She read it, and, good simple being ! she thought it the 
kindest thing that could have been written. With glistening 
eyes she handed it to Bessie to read. The paper was very 
thick and smooth, and on it was stamped the crest of the 
Dobbies. It ran thus : — 

“Dear Jane — What have you been about all this while? 
We were so sorry not to have you with us at Christmas. 
Frank wished me to invite you ; but I felt quite sure, if you 
came, it would only be to oblige us, knowing your retired 
habits, and consequently I could not think of encroaching so 
much on your good nature. But now that we have fine 
weather and a quiet house, we hope that no trifling excuse 
will prevent you coming to us. Frank and I are going to 
London for a time, and we shall take our eldest girls, but Miss 
Christie and the little ones will be at home — you are such a 
favorite with children ; and if you like to ask Mrs. or Miss, is 
it? — I forget the name — that lady that you live with — to 
come with you — you might enjoy your visit more. I have 
just seized a moment in the midst of packing to write to you. 
I could not go without hearing of you. You had better write 
to Miss Christie, in case we should have left, and she will send 
a carriage for you. In haste, yours truly, E. Dobbie.” 

“ Isn’t it so kind and considerate ? ” said Miss Dobbie. 

“ Who is Miss Christie ? ” asked Bessie. 

“ The governess.” 

“If she thinks it so kind,” thought Bessie, “it would*be a 


134 


BLINDPITS. 


pity to put anything else into her head.” “It will he a gcod 
change of air,” she said. 

“ It is such delicate kindness to me to ask your grand- 
mamma — do you think slie‘11 go ? ” 

“ Oh, I daresay she will. Grandmamma,” she continued as 
Mrs. Barclay came into the room ; “ here’s an invitation for 
you to go to Dobbiestanes with Miss Dobbie ; do you think 
you’ll go?” 

Mrs. Barclay stopped at this intelligence ; she saw the open 
note lying, and she said to Bessie, “ How is it that you have 
opened Mrs. Dobbie’s note to me ? ” 

“ It was to Miss Dobbie, Grandmamma.” 

“ An enclosure ? I was very favorably impressed by Mrs. 
Dobbie, the only time I met her ; and she has not forgotten 
me either, it seems. Well, since she is so kind, what day is 
fixed ? Give me the card, Bessie ? ” 

Mrs. Barclay conceived she had captivated Mrs. Dobbie ; 
that in her, honor had peered through the mean circumstances 
by which she was surrounded. 

“ There’s no card for you ; only a note to Miss Dobbie.” 

“ My cousin wants me to stay awhile ; and she thinks I 
would enjoy my visit better if you were with me,” said the 
innocent Miss Dobbie, naturally dwelling on herself as the 
chief figure. 

“ Oh ! ” said Mrs. Barclay, who also naturally considered 
herself the principal object, “ in that case I hardly think of 
going ; if you cannot enjoy yourself without me, you can stay 
with me here, Miss Dobbie.” 

Miss Dobbie humbled herself, and coaxed and entreated, hut 
Mrs. Barclay was inexorable. “ Ho, she was the widow of a 
gentleman, and she at least knew what was her due, if other 
people didn’t. Of course, if Miss Dobbie thought herself 
obliged by being asked, when the master and mistress of the 
house were from home, that was different.” 

“ I’m quite sure my cousins mean to be kind,” said Miss 
Dobbie ; “ but even if they had meant to insult me, I don’t 
need to feel insulted. I remember Miss Davie used to say we 


BLINDPITS. 


135 


could not help other people’s behavior, hut we could always help 
our own.” 

“It’s a pity Mrs. Dobbie hadn’t been at Miss Davie’s 
school,” said the old lady, cuttingly. 

“ So she was, — she and I were very intimate there. It was 
through me she met Frank ; ” and the poor lady went off in a 
lit of reminiscences ; after which, she took out her desk and 
wrote, fixing the day and hour of her visit. 

Miss Dobbie had hardly gone from Ironburgh, when a note 
from Miss Boston came ; the first since that which Barbara, to 
her cost, suppressed in part. She opened this in presence of 
her mother, that there might be no cause for jealousy; it was 
not a very lengthy missive. “Dear Barbara,” Miss Boston 
said, “send the bairn you spoke of to me; she’ll be better 
here in summer than in Ironburgh. When you want her, you 
can come for her. I’ll have one of the Miss Starks or Davie 
at the station for her. — Yours, B. B.” 

“ You’re sure that’s all this time, Barbara ? ” said Mrs* 
Barclay ; but she was well pleased so far. “ Bessie,” she went 
on, “ must go of course ; we can’t risk the consequences of a 
refusal; but, poor thing, I pity her ; only she needn’t stay very 
long. It would have been natural and proper had Barbara 
Boston applied to me about her ; but she never had ordinary 
breeding, and having lived so long attending to nothing and 
nobody but herself, she has grown worse instead of better ; if 
she had had all my trials, she would have learned to think 
more about others and less about herself.” 

“ But, mother, I think Bessie will be the better for a sum- 
mer in the country ; it’s what I’ve often wished for her, if only 
Miss Dobbie had been at home.” 

“ What difference does that make ? ” 

“ You’ll feel dull wanting them both, I doubt ?” 

“ Me dull ! When am I thinking anything else ? Only I 
say nothing, and there are people who never see below the 
surface. However, Bessie must go ; I would be the last to 
stand in the way of her prospects.” 

“ It’s her health I think of ; but there’s another thing 


136 


BLINDPITS. 


Mrs. Leadbetter wishes me to go to the sea-side with my 
pupils this season ; only you couldn’t live alone, could you ? ” 
“That I am living at all, Barbara, is a miracle. It would 
be rash to say what I couldn’t do ; but don’t mind me. 
Leave me, certainly, if it suits you.” 

Bessie read her invitation, and looking up said, “ Grand- 
mamma, what would Miss Davie say ? ” Mrs. Barclay 
smiled. “ She would say,” Bessie M T ent on, “ ‘ Bessie Barclay 
by all means go.’ Miss Boston hasn’t a polite letter-writer, I 
think. Miss Fraser was writing to her betrothed to-day ; and 
brought her letter to me to see if I thought it would do. It 
turned out to be copied from a polite letter-writer. I said, ‘ Is 
the man you’re writing to a goose ? ’ * Ho,’ she said, ‘ he’s un- 

common sensible.’ Then I said, i That won’t do. What do 
do you want to say to him ? She told me, and I ran it into 
easy sentences. I made a very nice love-letter. It’s far 
pleasanter work than teaching music, and she was more inter- 
ested in it too. She’s to copy it. If I go away, what will 
she do ? And I’ll have to drop my teaching, too. If Miss 
Boston only knew how much I’m engaged ! ” 

“ You’ll go off immediately at any rate,” said her aunt ; 
“ and we’ll see afterwards how we can arrange. Perhaps Miss 
Dobbie won’t stay long away.” 

“ Make your arrangements, and don’t take me into account 
at all,” said Mrs. Barclay. 

A week after Bessie went away, Miss Dobbie drove up to 
the door in the Dobbiestanes dog-cart, and renewed the invi- 
tation to Mrs. Barclay to accompany her to her cousin’s house ; 
and, seeing every prospect of being left alone, that lady 
yielded, and found no reason to regret the step. 

Then Miss Barclay locked up her house, gave her keys in 
charge to Mrs. Dods, and departed with her young friends to 
enjoy the sea-breezes. The flat in Berwick Street knew its 
inmates no more for some months : the babies screamed, and 
the pianos squeaked ; but the aesthetic ear of a stray mouse 
was all they ran the risk of wounding. The family were 
missed. Mr. and Mrs. Dods, coming out of their own door, 


BLIXDPITS. 


137 


and seeing the dirty brasses and deserted look of the opposite 
one, felt a blank. Mr. Pettigrew interested himself calculat- 
ing how cheaply each individual was securing country quar- 
ters, and over and over again expressed his surprise that Miss 
Barclay had not tried to let her house for the time, as he had 
suggested to' her. 

And Graham Bichardson, he was terribly at a loss where to 
bestow his evenings. He took long walks, it is true, and put 
a hook in his pocket ; and you will walk far in, or rather out 
of, Ironhurgh before you come to a place fitted for a book ; hut 
when he did open his hook, he wanted sympathy in reading. 
He missed Bessie’s odd remarks : he thought of her as a clever 
child; nothing more, you may he sure; for though Sara’s 
image was fading away like the mirage of the desert she had 
crossed en route to India, he ’could not forget, he said ; and yet 
Bessie’s slight fairy-like figure, and pale precocious face, with 
its large dark eyes, the fun in which belied the solemnity that 
ought to have belonged to them, would perk in before his 
mental vision. But she had gone to visit an old lady, he was 
told ; and for the other members of the family, he never mas- 
tered the details of their expeditions, although he had ample 
opportunity for doing so, if he had laid his mind to it. 


CHAPTER XVII. 


Blindpits looked a very different place in the month of 
May from what it did in the month of December. Heaven 
repaired Miss Boston’s rural seat at the same time it was 
touching up the cuckoo’s. It was embowered in trees and 
shrubbery, and the leaves were all in the beauty of youth ; no 
tussle with an angry wind, nor visit from a spiteful dust-cloud, 
had yet warned them of hard times coming. Even the ever- 
greens, which in winter, standing with their dark houghs 
banded in snow, looked like mourners at a funeral, had put on 
a dress of lighter, brighter green, and the firs hung pale ver- 
dant tassels from the ends of all their branches. David, with 
the assistance of a more experienced head and hand than his 
own, had put the garden in tolerable order, and indoors Bell 
had swept through the house like a simoon; for, however she 
might lie on her oars at other seasons, Whitsunday was the 
time when she made her grand yearly offering to the goddess 
of cleanliness. A stranger within Miss Boston’s gates would 
at once have seen, from Bell’s energy and determination, that 
she regarded it as a religious rite. And Miss Boston — she was 
very well — going in and out of doors with an article of attire 
upon her head which had hung in her lobby for the last twenty 
years, to he ready, when she needed it, for garden use, and a 
stick in her hand, which half-a-century before had been the 
companion of her father’s walks. She hardly needed it, but it 
had become her habit to carry it, and it served to point her 
meaning when she spoke to her dependants. 

It was the day she expected Bessie, and she went the 


BLIXDPITS. 


139 


length of her gate pretty frequently, and looked along the 
road for Miss Stark and her charge. In asking Bessie to visit 
her, she had been moved by pure benevolence, for she did not 
suppose that a strange child in the house would be any com- 
fort to her, neither did she think that she would he a comfort 
to the strange child. Barbara had thought of her niece’s 
health when she accepted the invitation for her ; and that was 
exactly what Miss Boston thought of when she gave it ; she 
understood the child was thin and pale, and however dull 
Blindpits might he indoors for a girl, outside there was health 
in every breeze. 

Hearly as a matter of course Miss Stark failed to he at the 
station at the time, and Bessie had fully half-an-hour to wait 
after the train had snorted off on its farther journey. She 
stood almost dazzled under the glorious May sunshine. 
When the rumble of the train had died away in the distance, 
there seemed to he nobody and nothing about the place. One 
man looked out of the station-window, another who sauntered 
up to her and asked if she had a ticket — which she had, and 
delivered up — and a big awkward-looking hoy, were all the 
figures in the scene, and even these did not break in much on 
the still life. 

On a hedge behind the station clothes were drying that 
looked supernaturally white, and flowers were blooming on 
each side of the line, in beds cut out in turf that looked as 
supernaturally green. Rich wood belted the under side of the 
railway nearly as far as could he seen, and down at the dis 
tance of a mile the sea lay as quietly as pussy, purring to 
itself no doubt, and showing great bands of bottle-green, or 
whitey-brown, or blue, as the currents, the light, and the bot- 
tom affected it. Little white cottages stood on the shore as 
if a dozen or two of albatrosses had alighted to rest — so 
dream-like were they ; and over all w r as the blue cloudless 
sky. 

u It’s good to be here,” thought Bessie, “ and it wouldn’t 
be difficult to be station-master here. I wonder if there are 
any station-mistresses? I don’t see why there shouldn’t — 


140 


BLIXDPITS. 


would aunt object ? I’m sure it would be far better than 
teaching, and not very public.” Here her eye fell on some 
very fat immense books, which seemed to have a dark blue 
page and a white one alternately. “ 1 wonder,” she thought, 
“ if that’s book-keeping by double entry ; it looks formidable, 
but aunt knows it, and it would be possible for me to learn.” 
Then she spied placards hung up, on which the words “ mile- 
age ” and “ demurrage ” occurred in tall letters. “ Onewould 
need to have a slight knowledge of law and technicalities, I 
suspect ; still it would be nice to live in that cottage among 
grass and flowers ; one could come out with a book and look 
at the sea and never tire.” At this point the station-master 
came out of the bandbox-like apartment sacred to his use, and 
passed her. She addressed him, “ You’ve a nice quiet place 
here.” 

“ It looks that the now,” said he, “ but we’re often in a fine 
bustle.” 

“ A great many passengers ? ” 

"Well, yes — a gey wheen — plenty in summer ; but it’s the 
goods traffic, the minerals, and the manures — plenty to do, and 
ye maun aye be on the spot.” 

“ It’s a delightful spot to be on,” she said. 

The man looked at her, wondering who and what she might 
be, and said, “ Ye’ll na liae been here afore ? ” 

“Never; and I was admiring your house and the beautiful 
flowers.” 

“Ay, they’re well enough to look at,” he said, drily. 

Now the station-master considered himself an underpaid 
slave, supplied with a house so damp that rheumatism lurked 
in every corner of it ; and as for the flowers, he did not care 
if he never saw one, but he was compelled to keep them in 
order to please the inspector and directors. 

By the time he had thus frankly ventilated his discontent 
and brushed the romance from the situation, Miss Stark’s little 
rusty black figure stood in the gateway casting a long after- 
noon shadow across the line. 

“ David,” she cried, in shrill falsetto tones, “ has the young 
lady not come ? ” 


BLINDPITS. 


141 


“ I dinna ken, mem,” said the big awkward-looking lad. 

Bessie stepped forward. 

“You’re Miss Stark?” she said. 

“ Of course I am, my dear, and I can’t express my sorrow 
at being so late ; but — ” 

Here the page, sent to squire her to Miss Boston’s towers, 
touched Bessie’s arm. “ Ye’re for Blindpits ? ” 

“Yes.” 

“ Weel, bae ye ony thing to carry; the mistress sent me to 
see if ye bad ony thing to carry.” 

Till that moment Miss Barclay’s niece had forgotten all 
about the slender luggage ; however, it was there, and David 
found it a small matter to shoulder it. 

“ As I was saying,” resumed Miss Stark, “ we can never 
altogether depend on our lobby-clock — not that it’s not an 
excellent clock, and we have a real regard for it, my sister and 
I ; no, we could never think of parting with it, it would he 
little short of a death in the house to do that, it has been in 
the family so long ; but we think the weather affects it, and 
w'e can’t depend on it to a minute ; then I forgot to wind up 
my watch last night — a thing that I am sure hasn’t happened 
for years, and Ann found the minute-hand had come off hers 
— quite a chapter of accidents — but it accounts for being late, 
an error we don’t often fall into,” and Miss Stark stopped to 
breathe. 

“ Oh,” said Bessie, “ it doesn’t matter, I’ve had time to 
look round ; everything is new to me here.” 

“ But you’ve seen Miss Boston ? ” 

“ Ho, never.” 

“ Then that’s a pleasure awaiting you. She is an excellent 
person ; a truly excellent person, hut peculiar. To a stranger, 
I could even fancy a little repulsive in manner; hut we’ve 
known her so long, and she is such a very excellent lady. 
How is Miss Barclay ? We all liked her so much, and were 
so disappointed when she left so soon. It was quite a general 
disappointment. We live so quietly here, my dear, and we all 
felt a lady like Miss Barclay such an acquisition.” 


142 


BLINDPITS. 


“ Wliat house is that ? — not Blindpits ? ” asked Bessie. 

“No, no, my dear, that’s the first house at this end of 
Heatherburgh. Blindpits is a quarter of a mile on the other 
side of Heatherburgh — a sweet place. That gentleman on 
horseback, who passed just now, and bowed, is Dr. M’Vicar ; 
he is such a fine old gentleman, quite an ideal old gentleman 
my sister and I say ; we’ll see his house as we pass — St. 
Vincent Villa. The uncle, who left him a good deal of money, 
was a merchant in St. Vincent, and he named his house in 
remembrance, which was very nice,” etc. etc. 

Thus Miss Stark discoursed till they arrived at Blindpits, 
where Miss Boston, in her ancient bonnet, and with her pilgrim’s 
staff, was standing at her gate waiting for them, like a being 
from another world. “Preserve me, Jean,” she said, “I 
thought ye was lost a’thegither, and what hae ye made o’ 
Davie ? ” 

“ He’s just behind, and I’ll explain how we are so late.” 

“Hever mind, Jean; I can jalouse how it happened; and 
now that ye’re safe here, there’s nae ill done. Bairn,” she 
said, turning to Bessie, “ ye’re white and wearied like. Miss 
J ean, tak her up the stair ; ye ken the road ; and come down 
as soon as ye like, and get some meat.” 

Miss Stark ushered Bessie to her chamber, saying, “ You’ll 
see, of course, that Miss Boston is a little peculiar, hut she is 
quite the lady ; a fine specimen, my sister and I always say, 
of the old Scotch lady.” 

“ How then, Jean,” said Miss Boston, when they descended, 
“ you’ll mak the tea ; I’m sure that lassie’s ready for some- 
thing.” 

“ Miss Boston,” said Bessie, “ Miss Stark is more tired than 
I am, I shouldn’t wonder. Do let me make the tea ; I like to 
do it, and I don’t often get it to do. Aunt does it herself, for 
she says I always forget what I’m about, hut I’ll be very 
attentive. May I do it ? Aunt says something about people 
knowing each other seven years before they snuff each other’s 
candle, hut it’ll do just as well for me to make the tea, and 
we’ll get acquainted after. I can’t wait seven years.” 


BLINDPITS. 


143 


u Bairn, if ye canna wait wi’ time afore ye, I canna wait wi’ 
time ahint me ; mak the tea, and Jean and me’ll rest and he 
thankfu’.” 

“ It is pleasant,” Miss J ane remarked, “ to see a young lady 
so ready to make herself useful.” 

“ Oh, I’m willing enough, to do myself justice, but some- 
how I’ve never done anything of importance yet.” 

“ Have you no ? ” said Miss Boston. “ I’m surprised at 
that, at your time o’ life too.” 

“ I should have thought Miss Barclay an admirable trainer 
of youth,” said Miss Jane. 

“ So she is ; hut what can the best artist do with poor 
material ? She’s taken infinite trouble to make me go like 
clockwork, and I can’t go like clockwork. I sometimes feel it 
so wicked that I can’t.” 

u Aweel, there’s nae clockwark here. Ye’ll spend the sum- 
mer running about out-bye, and get some color in your face to 
keep thae twa glowerin’ een in countenance — (it was thus 
Miss Boston spoke of Bessie’s deep translucent orbs) — but I’ll 
no forbid ye planning important business. It’ll maybe come 
your gate or ever ye ken.” 

“I wish it would; something worth doing; hut aunt is so 
apt to object to anything out of the usual course.” 

“ She’s perfectly right,” said Miss Stark ; “ one never can 
tell what things will come to. I see there’s a woman adver- 
tised to lecture, apparently under respectable auspices, in 
Ironburgh, Miss Bessie. Do you know anything of that ? ” 

“ Ho, nothing.” 

(i She’s a married woman, I observe,” said Miss Stark. 

“ Puir body ! I pity her man,” said Miss Boston ; “ he 
maun be a weak brother.” 

u Do you disapprove of women appearing in public ? ” 
asked Bessie. 

“ I disapprove of her man letting her, at ony rate.” 

“ But maybe he couldn’t help it,” said Bessie. “ There 
was Lapidoth, for instance. He must have felt small, I think, 
when Deborah and Barak went off on the war-path, and came 
back triumphant ; but likely he had no say in the matter.” 


144 


BLINDPITS. 


“ But slie was inspired/’ said Miss Stark. 

“ Yes ; but the question is, would she have been inspired if 
it is such a wrong thing as some people say for women to come 
out of their shells ? The subject is not new to me ; I’ve 
considered it pretty fully,” she remarked gravely. 

Miss Boston was amused, and thought, “ Barbara’ll no ken 
what to make o’ her ; she’ll be as sair fluttered as my gray hen 
that brought out ducks and saw them tak’ to the water.” 


CHAPTER XVIII. 


When the inmate of Ashburn Cottage had departed, and 
the long day was drawing to a close, Miss Boston intimated to 
her young guest that it was her habit at this season to dis- 
pense with the aid of artificial light, and Bessie at once declar- 
ed her willingness to conform to the custom of the house. 

“ It’s gude for ye, though ye may no like it, and I doubt 
ye’ll be dull here ; but I’ve sent word to Mary M’ Vicar to come 
the morn, and ye can gang whiles to the villa and whiles to 
Grantsburn, and I only hope ye’ll no weary for want o’ com- 
pany.” 

“ Oh, I’m not used to much company, Miss Boston, and I’ll 
get on famously ; everything is new to me, you know.” 

“ Everything new ! ” repeated Miss Boston as she shut her 
bedroom door; “everything new, puir thing, puir thing!” 
and she gave a sigh that told of sympathy and weariness. 
She had reached the time 

“ When all the world is old. lad, 

And all the trees are brown : ' 

And all the sport is stale, lad, 

And all the wheels run down.” 

With the guest in her other chamber 

“ All the world was young, 

And all the trees were green.” 

At the same moment that Bessie was pushing her dark 
luxuriant locks beneath her night-cap, Miss Boston was comb- 
ing up the few white hairs that w r ere left her, as she had done 

7 


146 


BLINDPITS. 


every night for more than half-a-century. Each was thinking 
kindly of the other, though both were sufficiently Scotch to 
avoid coming to a conclusion on the other’s merits till they 
should he better acquainted. 

At home all the bells of Ironburgh might have rung with- 
out awaking Bessie, but this night she was a little excited by 
being so much out of her usual, and she was roused every now 
and then by a peculiar noise as of a person stirring lightly. 
Sometimes it seemed in the room, and sometimes on the other 
side of a door near the head of her bed. She was not easily 
frightened, but if it had been a long dark night her courage 
would hardly have stood out. Was the house haunted ? Had 
Miss Boston some dark secret ? Was there a man in an iron 
mask ? or a Caspar Hauser concealed on the premises ? Yet 
the house had not seemed either old or intricate enough to 
harbor a mystery. If she could only have courage enough to 
try the handle of that door ; it must be there. There was not 
sufficient furniture in the room to shelter anything : only the 
bed she lay trembling on, an old four-post bed with chintz 
hangings that had been grand in their day, and the half of an 
old round table on which a little old glass stood, likely coeval 
with the bed, and which she had already discovered had the 
property of, when you were looking at it, suddenly turning up 
its wooden side, unless a brush or pincushion were stuck in to 
prevent it ; and a small old basin-stand over which was spread 
a shining snowy towel into which the basin sank — it resembled 
a baptismal font. There was no large press, or old wardrobe, 
or smell of drapery anywhere, in which a ghost could possibly 
hide. She lay till daybreak, and then the mystery revealed 
itself by an increased volume of flutter and twitter ; she rose 
boldly, pulled up the window-blind, and behold ! — a swallow’s 
nest snugly ensconced in each corner of the window. Believ- 
ed and ashamed, she lay down again and fell asleep, watching 
the handsome little beings as they darted to and fro. 

When next she awoke she heard the clock strike five ; she 
jumped up, bathed at the baptismal font, dressed, and going 
down stairs slipped quietly from the house. 


BLINDPITS. 


147 


Away towards the sea by the nearest road she could find. 
All the trees of the wood rejoiced. The fields were flushed 
with early verdure headed with dew. The freshness and 
vigor of morning were in the air. The sea, after yesterday’s 
rest, was all on the alert, knocking many little waves against 
each other, so that they hardly knew whether it was in jest or 
earnest. The hills on the other coast, lying in deep shadow, 
inclipt sea and land in their arms ; a sky, bright, blue, and 
clear, stretched to the horizon ; and a brilliant sun smiled over 
the country, and kept an eye on the roguish little waves that 
laughed in his face and reflected the light of it. Insects and 
birds did not seem to know how to crowd enough of enjoy- 
ment into the hour, but sheep and cattle winked and took 
things easy. 

It might have been creation-morn ; it was creation-morn to 
this young girl. She had never been abroad in the country 
early on a summer morning before ; she had never seen the 
sea ; she had never seen — what was it that sprung almost from 
her feet and darted up straight as an arrow, soaring aloft in a 
delirium of song, till it was lost among the downy cloudlets ? 
She needed no one to tell her it was a lark. Her impulse was 
to drop her body and soar after it, but as she could not man- 
age that, she stood and gazed, and gazed, and gazed. 

She was at the corner of a field where a heap of stones had 
been thrown when they were gathered from it, and at length 
she sat down on the stones, below an old hawthorn-tree white 
with blossom — she was steeped in delight. Carelessly she 
lifted a stone, and chancing to turn it up, there, beneath a 
gauzy transparent film attached to it, she saw hundreds, per- 
haps thousands, of creatures in motion, as if an ounce or two of 
minute gray beads had been endowed each with life and half- 
a-dozen legs and the will to use them. Hither and thither 
they rushed and ran, but to none of them it occurred to burst 
their prison-wall; it was a curious sight, as wonderful as the 
big bright world round her. 

“ Poor little beasties,” she thought, “ I never felt the least 
affection for spiders before, but you are a funny little crew— do 


148 


BLINDPITS. 


you think the last day has come ? There, don’t he frightened, 
I’ll turn you down, and go to sleep again.” She carefully re- 
placed the stone. 

“0 to be a naturalist, a poet, a painter, anything but — I 
wonder if the Erasers are practising the lessons I left them ; I 
wonder if aunt is enjoying herself as I am ; grandmamma and 
Miss Dobbie are not out of bed yet, of course. How magnifi- 
cent it is to be here ! but I doubt aunt wouldn’t think it right 
to sit on a lot of stones at the corner of a field.” 

Miss Barclay was enjoying herself, but not as her niece. 

Bessie, with her impulsive demi-poetic nature, her buoyant 
spirits, her quick intellect, her ignorance of evil, and freedom 
from care might well have enjoyment. She had no past with 
unhappy memories or lost possibilities; poverty she had seen 
often enough, but she had never come face to face with vice or 
crime. She did not know that beyond those hills her eyes 
loved to rest on, away among fair scenery, there stood a house, 
a sullen house, with grated windows, narrow passages, strong 
doors, and some hundreds of inhabitants who never inter- 
changed a word ; who only felt the air of heaven on their faces 
when passing round a circle five yards from each other, watch- 
ed by lynx-eyed warders, who each lived in a narrow cell, shut 
in with the dreariest hard labor, and guilt and shame. Yet 
they were human. Heaven had . lain about them in their 
infancy, weird angel-like smiles had wandered across their 
sleeping baby-faces. The sorrows of a fallen race had not laid 
hold of Bessie yet ; to her it was a glorious world. 

Miss Barclay was at the sea-side also, but she did not get 
out of bed at untimeous hours, nor go into ecstacies with 
scenery, she never did that in her life. * She said it was very 
pleasant and she felt great benefit from the change ; and to 
her kind and careful heart it was a cause of gratitude that her 
household were as well off in this respect as herself. She 
enjoyed herself judiciously — did her duty as far as in her lay, 
and had a consciousness of it. Barbara was not without a 
share of self-complacency — who could grudge her it ? As for 
people condemned to penal servitude, she might pity them in 


BLIXDPITS. 


149 


some degree, but not a thread in her nature sympathised with 
them ; so far as that went, they might have been inhabitants 
of the planet Jupiter. 

She was happy, and thoroughly at ease about Bessie ; she 
could see her gaining health and strength, and the bloom she 
had always been deficient in ; and she was perfectly safe with 
Miss Boston, who had few visitors, save the innocuous Miss 
Starts, and the only young gentleman of her circle, Dr. John 
Grant, being already matrimonially engaged, there was posi- 
tively no cause for anxiety. She felt very secure and grateful. 

Bessie burst into Miss Boston’s parlor, whisked off her 
bonnet, and flung it on the sofa — alas ! for her careful training 
— and said to Bell, “ Is Miss Boston not down yet ? Oh, what 
a glorious walk I’ve had, and I saw a lark — a laverock, you 
know — I like the Scotch name best, and it has not been over- 
done a bit.” 

“ Overdone ! ” what do ye mean ; ye dinna eat them in 
Ironburgh, do ye ? ” said Bell. 

“No, no; I mean no description has overdrawn it.” 

“ They eat them in some places, they tell me, — there’s a gey 
wheen here about.” 

“ And you have swallows too ; what beautiful shapely crea- 
tures they are ! ” 

" Dirty beasts,” said Bell ; ct I took the lang besom and 
knocked their nests down, but they began to build again, then 
I got Davie to tak’ the ladder and gang up to put an end to 
it, hut the Mistress happened to clap her een on him, and ye 
would hae thought she would hae ga’en by hersel’, she was in 
sic a way about the creatures being disturbed.” 

“ I am glad to hear it ; I like the swallows.” 

“ So you’ve been out already, bairn,” said Miss Boston, 
when she appeared; “ that’s right, and what way did ye 
gang ? — but ye can hardly gang wrang.” 

“ Ho, I went to the sea, not all the way, for I thought I 
might not get back in time ; and, 0 aunt, it is such a lovely 
walk ! Did I say aunt ? I’m so accustomed to that that I 
forgot.” 


150 


BLINDPITS. 


“There’s nae ill done; just ca’ me aunt, it’s better than aye 
Miss Bostoning.” 

“Very well, aunt, and I may make breakfast and do all 
these sort of things while I’m here ? how rich the hawthorn is 
iust now ! see there is a spray I got off an old tree at the cor- 
ner of a field ; I stood a long time under it, going towards the 
shore ; do you know it ? ” 

“ Ay, I mind the tree, I mind it weel, although it’s lang 
since I saw it, will he as bonnie now as it was fifty years 
since.” 

Miss Boston’s thoughts were wandering hack half-a-century ; 
that tree was hound up with the history of the absurd and 
tragic mistake of her life — it had been the trysting-place. 

“ Ay, just as bonnie and as fragrant — hid Bell put it in 
water — it minds me of when I was a bairn.” 

“ So it does me ; years ago, when I was in- the country with 
aunt, we got some of it, it seems like yesterday — how time 
passes ! ” 

“ Does it ? ” said Miss Boston smiling, “ ye’ll no find it pass 
so quickly here, I doubt. How are ye gaun to put off the 
forenoon ? ” 

“ I don’t know ; could I do anything for you ? When do 
you take your walk ? ” 

“ Me, bairn ! — I never walk ; I havena been out o’ my ain 
gate for mony a day.” 

“ Why not ? ” 

“ I’m no sae able as I have been, and it’s mair o’ a toil than 
a pleasure.” 

“iYou should get a pony-carriage and drive out ; I would if 
I were as rich as you.” 

“ How do ye ken I’m rich ? ” 

“ Oh, I’ve heard grandmamma say so very often.” 

“ Ay; how does she speak sae often about me ? ” 

“ I don’t know ; I think she would like to be rich too, and 
thinks of it a good deal. Aunt Barbara says ” — 

“ What does Barbara say ? ” 

“She says grandmamma once had plenty, so that she is to 


BLINDPITS. 


151 


be excused feeling the want of money ; but she always tells 
me that money doesn’t make people happy, that people that 
work for it and have just enough are perhaps happier than 
those who have a great deal. You knew aunt when she was 
a girl ; was she as good then as she is now ? ” 

“ She was aye gude sensible bairn.” 

“ Then she was never like me, and I doubt I’ll never be 
like her ; she teaches, you know, the whole year, and says she 
likes it, and I’m to be a teacher too.” 

“ And you dinna like it ? ” 

“I really cannot say I do, but I may some time; aunt says 
if I persevere I’ll find my reward.” 

“ And your grandmother — she’ll be expecting somebody to 
die and leave her a fortune* is she ? ” 

Bessie’s face grew red ; she couldn’t say yes, and she 
couldn’t say no, at last she said — 

“ Aunt — Miss Boston, I’ve heard grandmamma say some- 
thing of that kind ; but Aunt Barbara said, ‘No, we were not 
to depend on other people ; if any one left us money we w r ere 
to be thankful, and if they didn’t, they had a right to do as 
they liked with their own — aunt doesn’t care about money.” 

“ Nor you, I daursay ? ” 

“Yes I do — I’m not going to pretend I don’t; but I would 
like to make it myself 5 — only in some pleasant way. It’s nice 
to spend money you’ve earned ; for instance, I got four guineas 
for teaching music just before I came here, and I bought this 
frock, and that bonnet, and other things, and it really was 
pleasant ; and besides, I can pay my own travelling expenses, 
which is a great comfort ; and I gave a trifle to a poor woman, 
which I couldn’t have done, you know, had the money not 
been my own.” 

“ That’s true — it’s nae charity to gie away other folk’s 
siller ; and now, if ye care for reading, there’s a box o’ books 
in the corner there. Mr. Grant gets a box for me at a time, 
and when I’m done wi’ them he sends it away and gets 
another; maybe ye’ll get something to yer mind.” 

Time hang heavy, indeed ! it flew on wings as Bessie occu- 


152 


BLINDPITS. 


pied a corner of Miss Boston’s sofa with books which were all 
new, or at least new to her, and she was not at the critical stage 
yet; in youth a vast amount of trash can be assimilated 
without material injury, whether taken in by the mouth or 
eye. The window stood wide open, and she had only to look 
out to fancy herself in Eden’s bowers. Miss Boston wandered 
out and in, superintending her gardeners, but observing her 
visitor’s trance of enjoyment, and her heart warmed to the 
young girl, so innocent, so open, and quaint. She had feared 
they would bore each other; “but I like the lassie,” she 
thought, and she pondered the glimpses Bessie naturally gave 
of her home in Ironburgh, could put that and that together, 
and see that they did not roll in wealth ; and she yearned to- 
wards the aunt and niece. She could at once have brought 
them both home to her, but what was to become of Mrs. Bar- 
clay ? her she could not swallow. 

In answer to the invitation to Mary M’Vicar, Mrs. Gas- 
coigne sent reply that Miss M’Vicar had gone from home for a 
fortnight ; but Bessie was not disappointed, she thought her 
cup pretty full as it was. The weather was gorgeous, and she 
explored all the roads round, often recurring to her first love 
away shore wards, and her letters to her aunt were just an over- 
flow of happiness. 

“Do you know,” she said in one of them, “from anything 
grandmamma and you dropped about Miss Boston, I thought 
I would not get on very well with her, instead of that we are 
as thick as thieves (please excuse the expression). Yesterday 
when I was going out she called me to her and said, ‘ Bessie, 
ye’re no very gude at guessing time when ye’re out ; here’s a 
watch I hae nae use for, tak’ it and wear it, an’ ye’ll ken when 
to come in.’ I did not know what to say, and I don’t know 
what I said ; but I mind I heard her saying ‘ she was glad 
she had thought of it, for I wad never enjoy a watch mail* 
than the now.’ And I am proud of it — it is a beauty, and has 
a beautiful chain, and I know the hour so well — it’s half-past 
ten A. M. just now — it’s astonishing how often one needs to 
look at a watch, I wonder how I got on without it at all. 


BLINDPITS. 


153 


And — you would liardly believe it — but she sent for a new 
piano expressly for my use. She said, ‘ if I was to make my 
bread by teaching music, I was not to forget my business in 
her house.’ So there it is, and you may suppose between 
reading, and walking, and music, my time is pretty well filled 
up. It suits me, auntie, to be a lady, and do nothing but en- 
joy myself, only it’s a selfish kind of existence. And you see, 
after all, novels don’t give such a false view of life as you 
think ; getting a watch and a piano is very like the lucky 
things that happen to people in novels, and yet they have 
really happened to me. Miss Boston certainly is peculiar. 
Do you know she carries her spoon always about with her ? 
The first time I saw her produce it from the depths of her 
pocket at dinner-time, I could not help an uncontrollable fit of 
laughter. Ho, not if I had known I would lose her good 
graces for ever. She eyed me across the table in a queer kind 
of way, and then said, ‘ Bairn, I havena heard a laugh like 
that for mony a day, it does a body’s heart gude.’ ‘ I was 
afraid you would he angry,’ I said, 1 but I could not help it — 
it struck me as being so funny.’ I don’t think she’s easily 
offended.” 


CHAPTER XIX. 


Bessie took her walk shoreward nearly every morning 
custom could not stale its infinite variety. She was not always 
equally light-hearted. An undefined sadness would creep over 
her, which even an inspection of her watch could not alto- 
gether dispel ; the childish feet were in the brook that divides 
the ideal from the real. She was dabbling in this brook, and 
sauntering on the road by the sea, when the gallop of a horse 
behind made her thoughts fly like a covey of partridges off a 
stubble-field at the crack of a gun ; and the horseman, as he 
passed, drew up so suddenly that it might have been expected 
he would have flown over the animal’s ears. 

“ Bessie Barclay ! ” he exclaimed, “ who would have thought 
to see you here ? ” 

“ Is it more surprising than to see you here, Mr. Richard- 
son ? ” 

“Yes. I never thought of you being here, and I’m often 
here. I’m living with a gentleman, my uncle — at least I call 
him uncle.” 

“ And I never thought to see you here ; and I’m living with 
a lady, my aunt, or at least I call her aunt.” 

“ Who in the world is she ? ” said Graham, laughing. 

“ Miss Boston.” 

“ What ? the queer old woman that lives at Blindpits, and 
has such a temper ? ” 

“ Hush, hush, hush ! ” said Bessie, solemnly ; “ if I had as 
much money as grandmamma says Miss Boston has, I wouldf^ 
be queer, and set up a temper to-morrow ; it’s a great luxury. 

I would like if I could afford to have a temper.” 


BLINDPITS. 


155 


c< And how do you get on ? ” 

“ Famously.” 

“ Have you any visitors ? ” 

" Hone yet, except the Miss Starks, who don’t keep a tem- 
per between them even.” 

“ Don’t you find it prodigiously dull ? ” 

“ Ho, not at all.” 

“ I’m sure life is not cut with 1 a hammy knife ’ up there.” 

(This was a phrase between them, arising from both having 
been diverted by Mrs. Dods telling them that when she was in 
a shop one day, a girl came in, and asked for a quarter-a-pound 
jf beef cut with a hammy knife.) 

“ You’re mistaken ; it has flavor enough to my taste.” 

“ Perhaps too much flavor of the kind. Is she very 
cross ? ” 

“ Hot to me. I’ve seen no crossness. She has been very 
kind — very, — and has just been like a character in a novel, — 
t was telling aunt. She says novels lead young people to in- 
dulge false expectations, but I never expected this — look ; ” 
and Bessie took out her watch, and showed it to Mr. Bichard- 
son. He had got off his horse, and was walking by her side. 

“ That’s a pretty thing, Bessie, a very pretty thing,” and he 
looked down into the innocent pleased face. 

“ And so useful,” she said. 

“ I’m glad you’re so pleased with it.” 

“You think I’m childish. I hardly slept the night after I 
got it for thinking of it, I was so happy ; but I need not have 
told you I w r as such a child.” 

“ I’m glad there is so much of the child about you. I was 
afraid jmu were growing into a little old woman. Berwick 
Street is too much of a hothouse for you ; and the atmosphere 
up there,” pointing to Blindpits, “is too heavy also, I am 
sure.” 

“ That sounds very wise ; however, it’s exactly nonsense. 
But I’ve told you who my aunt is. Who is your uncle ? ” 

“ Mr. Grant. This is his horse I’m riding. Isn’t it a fine 
animal ? ” 


156 


BLINDPITS. 


“ I daresay ; but I’m no judge of the points of a horse.” 

“ But uncle is, I can tell you. Do you see what a small 
oeautiful head she has ? ” and he turned and stopped to 
stroke the animal’s nose. 

“ Would it let me touch it ? ” 

“ Let you ! yes ; it’s as quiet as a lamb.” 

“ I’m not frightened, you know ; but we’re not much accus- 
tomed to horses in Berwick Street.” 

“ I should say not. It’s the finest thing in the world a 
gallop through the country on a morning like this. Stand, 
Meg, stand. There, now, stroke her neck as much as you 
like.” 

She reached up her hand, and smoothed Meg’s shining 
neck. “ Isn’t it a pity,” she said, looking round, “ that every 
one can’t live in the country ? ” 

“ Not at all ; lots of people don’t care two pins for the 
country, they would think it a punishment to live in it. You 
don’t care for the country, do you ? People who wish to shine 
in public must prefer the city,” 

“ I never wished to shine in public, I only wanted to do so. 
Speak with precision, Mr. Richardson.” 

“ Ah ! there’s a difference between wish and want is there ? 
I must try to mind that. But how about your e youth and 
joys ? ’ ” 

“ Mr. Richardson, if you have nothing better than that to 
perpetrate, you’ll never shine in private. Meg, don’t you 
think so ? ” and she looked into the great liquid tranquil eyes. 

“Meg doesn’t think — that’s the beauty of her life; thought 
never gave Meg a headache yet.”* 

l<f That’s hardly a blessing.” 

“ Sometimes it would be a great blessing ; recently I would 
baye given much for Meg’s vacant head.” 

“ You don’t say so ? Your youth and joys mqst have been 
suffering an eclipse.” 

“ It was no joking matter.” 

Was ib not ? Then I’m sorry I joked.” 

How if, at this moment, Bessie had probed the Andersonian 


BLINDPITS. 


157 


wound a little — which from delicacy she refrained from doing, 
and did not even guess the nature of Graham’s calamity — or 
if he had exposed it farther, they would immediately have 
been on a different footing. The one would have thrown her 
whole heart into the business of consolation, and the other 
would at once have recognized the change of dynasty in his 
heart, and the course of events would have been changed. 
But possibly it -was as well. Who can say ? We can only 
see what does happen, but sometimes it is tempting to specu- 
late on what might have happened. 

“ Is Mr. Grant a nice man ? ” asked Bessie, to change the 
subject, which Graham did not continue. 

“ Nice ? You mean particular about things ? ” 

“ No, I don’t. I mean, do you like him ? ” 

“ You should speak with precision,” he said, laughing. 
“ Yes, I like him, and if you knew him you would like him 
too.” 

“We shall see. He is a connection of ours. I’ve heard 
grandmamma speak of him.” 

“ A connection of yours ! I had no idea of that. Then 
you’ll be a relation of mine ? ” 

“ Quite close, I should think. Your uncle’s wife was my 
grandmamma’s cousin, therefore I must be your ” — 

“ Cousin at the very least.” 

“Very well, cousin be it. I don’t think I’ve another cousin 
in the world, and I’m sorry to part with such a near and 
newly-discovered relation, but Miss Boston’s breakfast-hour 
will be here presently. By-the-by how is Mr. Dods ? Any 
W'ord of the ode ? ” 

“No word of the ode ; and Dods and Pettigrew are as good 
friends as ever. It’s really too bad of Mrs. Dods ; she ought 
to have more respect for her husband than insist on keeping 
Pettigrew against his inclination.” 

“ I don’t know. Aunt thinks Mr. Dods unreasonble in his 
dislike of a lodger that pays punctually 

“ May be ; but I’m always vexed for Mr. Dods.” 

As Bessie entered the parlor at Blindpits, Miss Boston 
said — 


158 


BLINDPITS. 


“ Ye’re a wee late this morning, Bessie ; hae ye "been at 
natural history again ? ” 

“ I met an old friend, aunt ; a Mr. Richardson, who lives 
near us in Ironhurgh. He is staying with Mr. Grant.” 

“ Oh, ye met him. Weel, that’s very natural history.” 

“Yes, it was natural enough; hut I didn’t know he was 
here, and he didn’t know I was here, it was quite an unex- 
pected pleasure.” 

“ It wadna he the less a pleasure for that.” 

“Ho, and he is really a nice creature. We all like him.” 

“ Mr. Grant aye speaks highly o’ him.” 

“ And he speaks highly of Mr. Grant.” 

“He may weel do that. Mr. Grant has been a gude freend 
to him.” 

“ Miss Grant,” said Graham Richardson at breakfast, “ have 
you been at Blindpits lately ? ” 

“ Ho. Why do you ask ? ” 

“ Have you, John ? ” addressing Dr. Grant, who was en- 
gaged operating neatly on his egg-shell. 

“ Let me see. I think it’s a fortnight since I was there. 
It’s a chance the humor you find the old lady in, and yon big 
lout she keeps is never at hand to take your horse.” 

“ There’s something there,” said Graham. 

“ What ? ” asked Miss Grant. 

“ One of my curiosities.” 

“Did you send it?” said John, while the thought darted 
through his mind, “ Is he going to curry favor with the old 
lady?” 

“Ho, I didn’t. I met it out among the May-dew this 
morning. It’s the queen of the fairies.” 

“ The queen of the fairies ! What do you mean ? ” asked 
Miss Grant. 

“When I came upon her she was standing glowering at the 
sea with eyes like lighted coals. As I spoke they faded down 
into the softest violet. I never saw eyes that changed color 
but hers.” 

“ Hear him ! ” said John. “ A case of fever imminent, 
May take some time to incubate.” 


BLINDPITS. 


159 


u Don’t count on patients till they sena for you. She’s a 
child — a mere child — and I’ve known her a long time.” 

“ Oh, I see ; the quaint child whose music soothed Saul in 
adversity. How is the excellent aunt ? perhaps the fever lies 
at her door.” 

a Most likely,” said Graham, laughing. 

“ Who is it that’s staying with Miss Boston ? ” asked Miss 
Grant. 

“A young lady from Ironhurgh, Miss Bessie Barclay by 
name.” 

“ Hot the Miss Barclay that was here in winter ? Ho, I 
think her name was Barbara.” 

“ That’s Bessie’s aunt, and, as John says, an excellent but 
very different person.” 

“ I was not well at the time, and I regretted she left before 
I could pay her any attention — a most deserving person I 
understand she is.” 

Graham smiled. He had an idea Miss Barclay would 
hardly relish such an eulogium. 

“I always wondered she went away so soon; but if she 
intended to send her niece, that accounts for it,” said J ohn. 

“ Did it need to be accounted for ? ” asked Graham. 

u Why, you know, Miss Boston is very rich, and it was nat- 
ural she should stay, and try to net some of the gold.” 

“ It would not seem so natural, if you knew Miss Barclay’s 
nature ; and as for the fairy queen, her practical worldly wis- 
dom is niV 9 

“ Your practical knowledge of human nature is nil also, I 
think, Graham.” 

“ So let it be. I never can fancy other people so much 
worse than myself.” 

“ Jack’s too suspicious,” said Miss Grant. “I sometimes 
tell him that. Well, I’ll call on your fairy, and see if I can 
bring her here for a -while.” 

“ Get Miss Boston to come too,” said J ohn. “ Tell her I 
said the change would do her good ; but she might not mind 
that from me ; you’d better get old Mac to call and advise her 
I really think it would benefit her.” 


160 


BLINDPITS. 


“ It’s very unlikely she’ll stir,” said Miss Grant, “ Either 
for you or old Mac, as you call him, although I think you 
might he on more ceremony with Mary’s father ; hut I can 
propose it to her.” 

“ Ay, try,” said Graham, “ and bring the fairy here. Poor 
little thing ! Pd like to see her planted in more genial soil, 
though I’ll hardly see it. I’ll likely have to go to Ironhurgh 
before she comes.” 

u The course of true love never did run smooth,” said 
John. 

“ There’s no love in the case,” said Graham. 

“Nothing hut pure benevolence ? ” 

“ Nothing,” echoed Graham. 


CHAPTER XX. 


There was a room at Blindpits called the drawing-room. 
It Miss Boston rarely entered ; and it stood as her mother had 
left it half-a-century before. Although not large, it was not 
quite a chair-lumbered closet. It had faded chintz hangings 
and spindle-legged furniture, among which the new piano 
stood prominent like a successful man in the middle of a 
group of poor relations, beaming and portly, while the con- 
sciously seedy beings got their backs to the light, and made 
themselves as small as possible. 

New people in the neighborhood, whose ideas had expanded 
with their circumstances, and sometimes at a rate that ignored 
circumstances, had their laugh at Miss Boston ; but she had 
her consolation in the reflection that she could buy some of 
these people up two or three times over. This source of con- 
solation was not a lofty one by any means, and would rather 
seem to put her on a level with the individuals who were 
amused at her narrow notions, so far behind the age. 

But she was not behind the age, except in practice. She 
watched public affairs, and she saw perfectly the altered drift 
of the public manners and customs towards self-indulgence, 
and luxury, and display, which has set in with increased 
wealth and prosperity, and she did not see it with a compla- 
cent eye. It was not merely the prejudice of age looking back 
with favor on the ways of its youth ; it was that she, in a 
great measure, despised externals, and certainly despised peo- 
ple that leaned on them. True, she had not builded houses, 
or planted vineyards, or gathered to her men-singers and 


162 


BLINDPITS. 


women-singers ; but Solomon bad not a more firm conviction 
that all is vanity than she bad. Novels bad come in her box, 
the heroes and heroines of which, with life, and love, and 
health, counted these as nothing, because they had not money 
enough to float them in what they called u society,” and 
uphold them in it amid sensuous luxury. She considered 
them as only extreme types of modern life. She did not 
believe in the existence of such contemptible creatures. Even 
comfort — the kind of cat-cosy comfort that is so popular in 
these days — was a poor thing in her estimation. Show her 
men or women who could face a hard lot ; who could take it 
in their hand and thole , and come out uncrushed with unim- 
paired manhood, and these were her heroes. 

It is quite consistent with the inconsistency which is the 
w^arp and woof of human nature, that Miss Boston valued 
herself on her money ; but it was more as it gave her a whip- 
hand in the neighborhood than for any material advantage. 
She was cynical, of course, and warped by the circumstances 
of her life ; but surely the thrifty self-denial of our ancestors, 
though possibly carried to an extreme, was a nobler thing than 
the easy self-indulgence of their descendants, against which, 
in her expenditure, Miss Boston lifted up her protest to small 
end, except getting a character for niggardliness ; but as nig- 
gardliness was not her foible, she could afford to chuckle over 
her reputation for it. 

Bessie and the piano had this faded little drawing-room 
pretty much to themselves, except when Miss Boston came to 
listen to their joint performance. Once she took her seat in 
front of the instrument, and played an old Scotch reel with 
much energy and precision, to her visitor’s astonishment. 
When she stopped, she rose and left the room without saying 
a word; no persuasion ever induced her to play it again. 
“Na, na,” she said, “ I’ll play nae mair, it was just the last 
tune to play the house out.” 

Bessie was dreamily touching the keys of the piano in com- 
pany to her own notes — her singing had more taste and feel- 
ing in it than science, of which, indeed, it was likely as desti- 


BLINDPITS. 


163 


tute as her reading was of elocution ; she had got no lessons 
in either art — when Miss Grant called and made her way up 
stairs towards the sound. 

Miss Grant was many years older than her brother — a 
placid kindly woman, good-natured — which sometimes means 
not over-sensitive, and commonplace. She always reminded me 
of one of the three wives of a popular clergyman, a short 
sketch of whose life by her husband I have seen. He 
describes her as relieving him of every trivial care, and 
accomplishing a great amount of good with very ordinary 
talents — facts which he records for the encouragement of 
women in general. If Miss Grant and her clergyman had 
not unfortunately missed each other, she could fully have 
merited such a certificate ; however, life is a ravelled hasp, 
and Miss Grant was Miss Grant, with n© prospect of immor- 
tality from the pen of a bereaved husband. 

She examined Bessie pretty minutely, for she was not des- 
titute of a laudable curiosity. Bessie and her piano, in that 
fossil of a room, had a good chance of recommending themselves 
to any lover of the picturesque. She was low in stature — it 
was possible she might grow yet, however — of a slight fairy- 
like make, with dark lustrous eyes, and her face, usually pale, 
had got a tinge of color from outdoor exercise, but not enough 
to take much from its statuesque beauty ; her thick dark hair 
was merely brushed from her forehead, and coiled classic- 
fashion at the back of her head. She could not have worn it 
any way better suited to her, although it was neither classic 
nor becoming considerations that influenced her, hut simply 
what was least trouble. She never lingered over anything 
she had to do with her hands, generally taking what she 
called “ t short method with deists.” She had seen a hook 
advertised with that title, and it passed into her language as a 
phrase to be used when she wanted to denote a short cut to 
anything, and she was fertile in short cuts, except in reading, 
or walking, or music ; these were all “ linked sweetness long 
drawn out.” Her dress was only a cotton print, but anything 
looked well on her, and she looked well in anything. 


164 


BLINDPITS. 


Bessie, on her part, mastered Miss Grant’s outside in lialf- 
a-second. She was a tall, stoutish, round-shouldered person, 
with a fat elderly face, on which her grey hair straggled a 
little ; she was richly clad in a slovenly manner, betokening 
either carelessness or want of skill. However much good 
such a lady may accomplish with the talents allotted her, you 
don’t expect her to be the life and soul of a party, but she 
chatted small change with Bessie till Miss Boston appeared in 
her mediaeval bonnet and pilgrim staff, looking very like a 
witch : if she had lived two hundred years sooner I would not 
have given much for her chance of escaping a watery ordeal. 

“ I didna ken ye was here, Miss Grant, till just the now ; I 
was in the garden looking after Davie, and he needs to be 
looked after. I fancy you and Bessie have introduced your- 
selves, seeing I was not here to do it ? ” 

“ Oh, yes ; we had no difficulty ; I had heard of your visitor 
from Graham Bichardson, and I want you and her to come to 
us for a while — you won’t object, Miss Boston, will you ? I 
was to tell you from John that he thinks the change would do 
you good.” 

“You’re very kind, Miss Grant, and John’s very kind — 
very — it’s no every dandy young doctor that would send as 
gude advice to an auld body like me free gratis ; however, I 
never leave my ain house, but Bessie, I male nae doubt, will 
be glad o’ the change.” 

“ I would like to go,” said Bessie, “ but I would like better 
if you would go too. If you don’t go, I’ll remain here ; my 
visit is to you, you know.” 

“ Nonsense, bairn,” said Miss Boston. 

Just then a sharp knock at the outer door was heard. Mrs. 
Gascoigne was standing before that weather-beaten bit of 
timber, looking at the remnants of blistered paint that still 
adhered to it, and speculating on the amazing fact that there 
are in this world people who have plenty of money and don’t 
use it, which was very aggravating, taking into account that 
there are other people, with a distinguished ability for using 
any amount, who have little or none to use. 


BLINDPITS. 


165 


Mrs. Gascoigne ascended to tlie other ladies. Bessie thought 
she had never seen such a “ lady-like ” person. She sat dumb, 
admiring her, her elegant figure, her dark expressive face, the 
sweep of her dress, and all its trifling but significant details. 
Mrs. Gascoigne spared neither time, nor trouble, nor thought, 
nor, in a judicious way, money on her attire, and she had what 
avails where all these will not — taste and skill in the art of 
dressing. Beside the witch-like lady of the house, and the 
humdrum countryfied Miss Grant, she looked like a superior 
being. 

“ I’m sorry, so sorry, Miss Boston,” she said, “ that Mary’s 
not at home, when you have your young friend with you, but 
she’ll be back in a day or two, I expect.” % 

“ Oh, ay, they’ll hae plenty time to forgather yet.” 

“ When is Mr. Grant to be home ? ” turning to Miss Grant ; 
“ we have not seen Dr. Grant for some days, but that is not 
astonishing, at present, of course.” 

“ My brother did not say when he would be home exactly, 
and we have had Graham Richardson with us, who has taken 
up John’s time I suppose.” 

Bessie observed a certain dryness in Miss Grant’s tone to 
Mrs. Gascoigne, and also observed that either that lady was 
ignorant of it, or magnanimously overlooked it. 

“And I hope,” said Mrs. Gascoigne to Bessie, “that you 
are not going to run away from us so soon as your sister did ? ” 

“ My aunt.” 

“Yes, I beg pardon, your aunt; I never could understand 
why she left in such a hurry.” 

“ Ay, it was mysterious,” said Miss Boston ; “ but it’s a fine 
thing a mystery, especially in a dull place like this.” 

“ There was nothing mysterious in it,” said Bessie, “ aunt 
had to ” 

“ Now, Bessie, dinna you let the cat out o’ the pock — settle 
your ain affairs. When are ye gaun to Grantsburn ? ” 

“ I would rather not go without you.” 

“ Gae ’way gae ’way ; ye’re no a bairn tied to my apron- 
string.” 


163 


BLINDPITS. 


“ Just say you’ll come too, Miss Boston,” said Miss Grant 
u wliat can there be to hinder you ? ” 

“ There’s a woman in the kitchen, and a callant in the 
garden. If they were left to their ain devices, I wonder what 
things would come to ? ” 

“ It isn’t that merely,” said Mrs. Gascoigne, “ but I can 
quite understand, Miss Boston, when people are not so young 
as they have been, they like their own fireside best, and a 
change of beds is not a pleasant prospect. I can sympathize 
with that kind of feeling.” 

“ Weel, I canna,” said Miss Boston ; “ my ain fireside is no 
aye sae cheery that I need grudge leaving it ; and as for my 
bed, I’m no ta’en up about it yet et ony rate, I’m thankfu’ to 
say.” 

Mrs. Gascoigne had a talent for setting the old lady on 
edge. 

“Very well, Miss Boston,” she said; “you know best, but I 
think you would run a great risk of catching cold, and if you 
take my advice you’ll stay at home.” 

“I never was muckle gi’en to takin’ advice though, Mrs. 
Gascoigne ; and if I gang and tak’ the cauld, it would be wark 
for the doctor, ye ken.” 

“ I don’t see why you should take cold,” said Miss Grant ; 
“ our house is a very w T arm comfortable one, and John said 
you would be the better of the change.” 

“ Young men are apt to be rash,” said Mrs. Gascoigne. 

“ And auld women,” said Miss Boston. “ I’ll risk the 
cauld for ance rather than Bessie here should lose her visit.” 

“Well, I must say you put the present generation to shame, 
Miss Boston. I can’t but say it’s a thought to me to leave 
home.” 

“ But dinna be disheartened, Mrs. Gascoigne ; that’ll wear 
off, and ye’ll be keen to gang. Auld folk’s twice bairns, ye 
ken.” 

“ Doctor,” said Mrs. Gascoigne, when she was seated oppo- 
site her brother at dinner, “ I was up seeing the old woman at 
Blindpits to-day, and we had some sharp-shooting. I reallj 


BLINDPITS. 


167 


like the old lady, although she’s not in love with me ; and I 
like that stupid old Miss Grant too ; she was there.” 

“ I’m glad to hear it, Bobina.” 

“ And there’s a niece of the Miss Barclay’s, who was here 
in winter, at Blindpits just now.” 

“ I am glad to hear that too,” said the doctor. 

“ What makes you glad of that ? ” 

“ I would like to see that family share the spoil. I like 
fair play. I planned to bring these people about her, and I 
would like to see the business well through.” 

“You are very disinterested, doctor. John Grant would 
hardly thank you.” 

“ Most likely not.” 

“ I think he is a good deal annoyed.” 

“ I haven’t a doubt of it, hut he’ll he the better of a lesson.” 

“ In wdiat ? ” 

“ Oh, in living and letting live. Mary has made a prudent 
choice — at least her choice is prudent. Poor thing, she needn’t 
have been in such a hurry, only it would have made little dif- 
ference. Women never gather sense in these matters.” 

“I daresay they are oftener led'by feeling than prudence,”, 
said the widow with a faint sigh, “ hut I think Mary has com- 
bined them. John Grant is decidedly, taking all things into 
account, the best match in the place.” 

“ So be it ; and my consolation is, that if he had not got 
her, some one else would. I wish his father had struck in for 
her.” 

“James, I am surprised to hear you. In your experience 
as a medical man you must have seen the misery of unequal 
matches ; he might he her father.” 

“ If people are well matched otherwise, age matters the less, 
and you’ll very likely see Grant marry a girl yet, and he 
happy enough.” 

“ Mr. Grant may marry, but he knows better than to marry 
a girl, or I’m deceived.” 

“ That’s possible enough. What like is the new importa- 
tion at Blindpits ? ” 


168 


BLINDPITS. 


“She is a white-faced child, with dark "big eyes; but the 
best of it is, she is so attached to the old lady already that she 
can’t go to Grantsburn without her; and, better still, Miss 
Boston believes it, and rather than she should not go, she 
shakes her feathers and goes with her.” 

“ Ah, that looks well.” 

“ Well, indeed, talk of the prudence of young people ! I 
feel myself a mere infant beside them. It wouldn’t have oc- 
curred to me in a June day to say, I couldn’t leave yon old 
witch, and yet I like her too in a way.” 

“ She’ll be the better for the change ; I would have pre- 
scribed it if I had thought there vras any chance of her tak- 
ing my advice ; she is a surprising old woman after all ; I 
shouldn’t wonder but she’ll see us all out yet. Grant is a 
favorite of hers, and my impression is she would like to see 
him marry the person — the Miss Barclay who was here at 
Christmas ; she wouldn’t be my taste, but tastes differ, and if 
Grant is agreeable it would be a sensible thing ; the old lady 
has sense.” 

“ But she won’t be Grant’s taste ; she is a stout respectable 
woman. I’ve nothing to say against her, but the idea is 
ridiculous. When Grant marries, he’ll marry a lady in ap- 
pearance, manner, and habits, and position, you’ll see.” 

The doctor was called out, and went musing, “Can he 
propose to marry her ? ” The subject, however, dropped from 
his mind very shortly ; it would be a good thing if it hap- 
pened, and if not, there was no harm done — that was all the 
doctor saw in it. 

All the doctor saw in it, but by no means all the doctor’s 
sister saw in it. Mrs. Gascoigne was not in love, but if reason 
were she was aware she could get up a very respectable liking 
for Mr. Grant — quite enough to marry upon. She sometimes 
chafed a little in her brother’s house, not but that he w*as very 
kind, but that he was somewhat dull, somewhat cautious ; in 
short, if she wanted money she generally had to ask it. 
There were people even among his own patients who did not 
hesitate to call Dr. M’ Vicar an old wife ; not meaning, I fancy, 


BLINDPITS. 


169 


to be complimentary, although I have known old wives of 
whom the world was not worthy ; hut he was a kindly old 
wife, with a sense of justice, and even of generosity, fond, per- 
haps, of keeping his own guineas, hut not greedy of the 
guineas of other people, and hy a little management the 
widow generally got her hand a good way down into his 
purse ; hut she disliked the process. Also, she could look for- 
ward a little, and see the doctor’s affairs pass gradually into 
the hands of Dr. Grant ; and, however many things he might 
have to recommend him, he was aware she would watch his 
father-in-law’s funds with cordial vigilance. In short, at St. 
Vincent Villa she was sure of bread and butter, accompanied 
with control and irksome dependence; at Grantshurn, of 
“ honor, love, obedience, troops of friends,” or some things 
that look like all these, and she was ready to be content 
with a good imitation. She was cynical in her way, as well 
as Miss Boston, and hardly believed in such blessings falling 
into the laps of poor people. 


CHAPTER XXI. 


Miss Boston left Bell her woman-servant, and Davie her 
“man ’’-servant, in charge of her house and all its belongings. 

“ I don’t think you need be anxious,” said Bessie ; “ I don’t 
see what mischief they could do, unless they set the place on 
fire.” 

“ Well, Bell may tak’ it into her head to do that ; after tak- 
ing the besom to the swallows’ nests, I wadna say what she 
would do, but it’s a’ insured ; however, I hope it’ll no be 
burned, for I couldna begin to build again wi’ sic spunk as the 
swallows, puir things.” 

“ I wish Mr. Grant had been at home. I hope he’ll come 
before we leave.” 

“What’s your anxiety to see him, bairn ? ” 

“ I’m not anxious, I’m only curious ; Miss Dobbie said it 
would do so well if” — and she stopped, feeling that she was 
going to say what, perhaps, she had better not. 

“ Wha’s Miss Dobbie ? ” 

“ Have I never spoken to you of Miss Dobbie ? That’s un- 
grateful ; she does most of my mending ; I should do it m y- 
self, but she insists on doing it, and it’s a great temptation.” 

“ But ye havena tell’t me wha she is ? ” 

“ Just Miss Dobbie. She lives with us. She lost all her 
money by the failure of some bank, I think, and her friends 
bought her an annuity ; she is visiting at her cousin’s just 
now — Dobbie of Dobbiestanes ; grandmamma is with her 
there.” 

“A boarder; that’s the way they eke out their living,” 


BLINDPITS. 


171 


thought Miss Boston ; “ puir Barbara ! she’s had her ain 
adoes, hut I needna pity her ; folk are as weel that hae to 
work for their bread as folk that came to it ready baked, if 
they kent it.” 

“ And does Miss Dobbie ken Mr. Grant, then ? ” she asked. 

“ 0 no ; she has heard grandmamma speak of him.” 

u And what was it she said would do so weel ? ” 

“ Oh, some nonsense, not worth repeating.” 

Dr. Grant and Graham Bichardson received them at the 
gate. The young doctor tenderly lifted Miss Boston from the 
carriage, and gave her his arm up the steps into the house. 

Graham said, “ Come, Bessie, and we’ll have a stroll about 
the place. I wrote and got another day or two on purpose to 
be here when you are here.” 

“ I’m glad of that, but I thought you would he longing to 
get back to Ironburgh.” 

“ I have not been long enough here yet for that. Now, do 
you admire this place ? ” 

Bessie looked round. “ Should I admire it ? ” 

u Ah, that’s what I’m asking.” 

“ I like it, and I don’t like it. I’ve often read of the Dutch 
style of tree-clipping, but I never saw it before. It looks 
stiff.” 

“ Yes, but I like it. That house is nearly two hundred 
years old, and these dipt evergreens too.” 

The evergreens stood here and there upon the velvet turf 
in front of the house ; no trunk or branches to be seen, but, 
resting on the ground, each stood up a wide, lofty, leafy pyra- 
mid. 

“ Haven’t they a queer effect,” said Graham, “ even now at 
noon ? but in the twilight or moonlight, I could fancy they 
were a herd of old-world animals standing round, silently 
chewing the cud ; and in winter, when they are covered with 
snow, you would think a family of icebergs was bearing down 
on the house.” 

u They are dreary, and there is plenty of fine wood here. 
Why not cut them down ? They would never he missed.” 


172 


BLINDPITS. 


“ You are mistaken. It would change the character of the 
place. It would he nothing without them, and the Marquis 
likes to keep it up as it is. It belonged to an old family who 
ruined themselves, and when it and the estate came to the 
hammer, the Marquis bought it. Grant was their name, and 
yonder is the burn ; ” and he pointed to the other side of the 
lawn, where there was a considerable stream that had not been 
trimmed nor trained like the evergreens, hut evidently had 
had the making of its own bed, in which it lay quiet enough 
at the moment. 

“ It looks sleepy just now,” said Graham ; “ hut if you saw 
it after a spate, or better, after it begins to calm down a bit, 
how it dashes forward, then runs away round a stone, chases 
bits of foam into all the corners, and keeps them there, 
whirling round and round, and trying to get out. I’ve 
watched its antics often till I’ve grown giddy.’ 

“ And where does it run to ? ” 

“To the sea. Burns run to the sea as children to their 
mothers ; but first it goes through the Marquis’s park, where 
it joins the Heatherburgh burn ; and then, the ground being 
flat, they glide quietly on till they go into the sea by the side 
of a little fishing village.” 

Graham and Bessie were standing on the middle of a rustic 
bridge that led to a pathway on the other side, and Bessie 
stooped and looked down into the clear water, showing all its 
pebbles, and singing the song it had learned in the beginning, 
as she said, 

u Oh, burnie, you’ll have to mind what you are about after 
you are married, and go to live in a gentleman’s park.” 

“ So it does. You would think butter wouldn’t melt in its 
mouth,” said Graham; “ but follow this path if you want to 
see it at its wildest ; and if you want to see its birthplace, 
make a journey to these hills ; ” and he pointed to a range of 
high lands that rising from the sea-shore, stretched across the 
country like a back-bone. “ Let me tell you these hills, accord- 
ing to geology, are older than the Alps.” 

“ Indeed,” said Bessie, “ they are little of their age.” 


BLINDPITS. 


173 


Being conscious of the limited nature of his geological lore, 
Graham wondered if she were quizzing him for sticking this 
small piece of ware in the window, and he looked at her. 

“ Compared with the Alps, you know,” she said, “ or even 
the Ben family.” 

“ They are not Bens, they are Laws.” 

“ And all they should he, no doubt ; but I’m no geologist, 
I’m sorry to say.” 

When they got round by the back of the house they camo 
upon Miss Boston, still supported by the young doctor’s arm, 
inspecting Miss Grant’s poultry. Her poultry were like her- 
self. With very ordinary talents, they accomplished a great 
amount of good — that is, without any defined lineage or breed- 
ing, or even foreign airs or graces, they were cosy, well-fed, 
motherly-looking barn-door fowls, who laid eggs and brought 
up large families when permitted to do so, and when defeated 
in the attempt, still went on with their efforts. 

“ How,” said the doctor, “ aunt is as proud of that hum- 
drum collection as if they had all come home from a show with 
prize-tickets attached to them.” 

i( Ay ; ye see, doctor, your auntie and me doesna ken ony 
better,” said Miss Boston, u and where ignorance is bliss, it is 
folly to be wise.” 

Dr. Grant, though very attentive to Miss Boston when 
present, was not often present; “a doctor’s time,” he re- 
marked, “ being so little at his own disposal.” But, in his 
case, duty and inclination went hand and hand, and he had 
the satisfaction of hearing Miss Boston repeatedly commend 
his attention to his profession. 

Graham went back to Ironburgh, and Bessie was left alone 
with the two ladies. Another young girl would have felt the 
post of maid of honor to these ladies rather slow and dull. 
Hot so Bessie. It was what she had been accustomed to all 
her life. She slipt into it naturally ; and whereas her grand- 
mamma was difficult to please, and rarely said thank-you, Miss 
Boston and Miss Grant, to her wonder, seemed to prize her 
small ministrations. They had not been accustomed to the 


174 


BLINDPITS. 


grace of attention that is horn of a kind heart and quick 
wits. 

But Mary M‘Vicar came home, and a friendship sprang up 
between her and Bessie as rapidly as Jonah’s gourd; and the 
grand fact of Mary’s matrimonial engagement to John Grant 
being communicated, Bessie found herself in the delightful 
post of confidant, which she had never filled in her life before. 
Mary had her to St. Vincent Villa nearly every evening that 
she was sure Dr. Grant would he engaged elsewhere, and Mrs. 
Gascoigne was kind and gracious, and entertained them with 
large slices of her experience, which seemed to have been mani- 
fold indeed, and as it was all new to Bessie, and Mrs. Gas- 
coigne herself was very new to her, she enjoyed it excessively, 
and admired, with hated breath, the portrait of the late Lieu- 
tenant Gascoigne, and nearly shed tears over the funeral, that 
was attended by all the principal people of the place, including 
some men of title. 

Mary also introduced her to the Ainslies ; “ new ” people 
they were called, hut if it was a sin to he new, it seemed to 
sit very lightly on their consciences. It was whispered that 
Mr. Ainslie had begun life as porter in a warehouse, and Mrs. 
A. as a domestic servant ; hut people must he new sometime, 
and if an acorn buried in the earth is one day to be monarch 
of the forest, there seems to he no reason why a porter should 
not he the root of an old family; next best to having an 
ancestor, if not better, is to he an ancestor. Be this as it 
may, the Ainslies enjoyed themselves, and brought up a large 
family, happily ignorant of the sin and shame of being new. 
A rich man is seldom the victim of neglect. A rich man, 
with a large family, was not to he overlooked by Dr. M‘ Vicar, 
and Mary was Susan Ainslie’s intimate friend. And now 
Bessie was plunged for the first time into genteel young-lady 
life, and the contrast between her own habits of feeling and 
thought, and those of her new friends, sometimes struck her, 
hut being young she allowed herself to he carried away out of 
her usual ruts with an enjoyment that did not think. 

She had nearly forgotton her curiosity about Mr. Grant, 


B-LINDPITS. 


175 


when she heard his son say to Mary M‘ Vicar, “ My father’s to 
he home to-morrow ; his horse is to be sent to the Inneston 
Station for him.” 

“ I wonder he is so fond of riding,” said Mary ; “ you 
would think at his time of life he would prefer driving.” 

“ Wait till he gets himself drenched, and finds a rheumatism 
in his shoulders,” said John. 

“ I hope I shall have to wait a long time,” said Mary. 

Next day Bessie met Mr. Grant. She had gone to a bridge 
with a low coping, on which she often sat. Here the burn was 
framed in trees like a picture ; it spread into a quiet wide pool 
just above the bridge ; little birds were always hopping about 
on the stones at its edge, using it both as a drinking-cup and 
a looking-glass, at least it seemed so, from the way in which 
they cocked their heads from side to side, and made other little 
motions indicative of being pleased with their personal appear- 
ance ; there were many wild flowers blooming, but especially 
there was a cluster of ferns growing out of the wall of the 
bridge, not far above the water, that for grace of form and 
beauty of coloring were a study; they gave the finishing 
touch to a nook of rare loveliness, but nature keeps all her 
out-of-the-way holes and corners in high perfection. Bessie 
was sitting in the shade of the trees when Mr. Grant rode up. 
She smiled, and he stopped and looked at her. 

“ I don’t know you,” she said, “ but I know your horse.” 

“ You couldn’t have a better introduction.” 

“ Are you — you’re not Mr. Grant ? ” 

“ Yes ; why not ? ” 

“ 1 thought Mr. Grant was an old man. 

Mr. Grant laughed. “Very well, old or young, I’m Mr. 
Grant, and I suppose you’re Miss Barclay’s little niece that’s 
staying with my sister. Come,” he said, stretching his band 
to her, “ spring up, and I’ll give you a gallop home on Meg.” 

She drew herself up to the full height, which was not very 
great after all, and as she was standing in a hollow it was dif- 
ficult to look majestic; but she said, “I’m not a child, Mr 
Grant.” 


176 


BLIXDPITS. 


iC Oh, iudeed ! I beg pardon for my extraordinary mistake.” 

“ You needn’t, I don’t mind $ I daresay I would like the 
ride well enough, but I’m sure aunt would think it out of the 
question.” 

“ That’s right ; always stick to what your aunt would like, 
she knows best.” 

“ I always do, although there are subjects on which we dif- 
fer, and on which I think I’m right.” 

“ I would like to know what these are, but not now, Meg’s 
impatient. Since you won’t go with us, we must go without 
you,” and Mr. Grant touched his hat very deferentially and 
rode on. 

“ And that’s Mr. Grant,” thought she, as she sat down again 
on the cope-stone of the bridge ; “ he’s not the least like what I 
expected ; grandmamma must surely be mistaken about him, 
but I’ll have quite time to form an opinion of him, and see 
whether Miss Dobbie’s project would be suitable or not ; ” and 
she resumed her study of the burn, the trees, the birds, and the 
ferns. “ Now,” she thought, as at length she rose, “ when 
I’m at home in Berwick Street, if I shut my eyes and ears I 
can be here any time, I have it thoroughly by heart.” 


CHAPTER XXII. 


Bessie had been fired with the ambition of giving Mary 
M’Vicar some present when she was married, and contrary to 
her known tastes and habits, she was busy with an elaborate 
piece of needlework, only sustained under the severe and un- 
wonted toil by her friendship for Mary. She sat stitching 
away in the drawing-room window that looked to the sea, 
watching the white-winged ships and the steamers that oc- 
casionally passed up and down with their long graceful feathers 
floating out into the air behind them, and the little fishing 
craft, and the gulls, and the dreamy cottages, and the effect of 
light and shade, and all the beauty crept into her soul, and 
was being laid up there for use when she should want it, as the 
sun’s beams are imprisoned in coal, which process interfered 
sadly with the work of the bright little instrument she held in 
her hand. Mr. Grant had been talking to Miss Boston and 
his sister at the other side of the room ; but he came over and 
stood beside Bessie, and without any preamble said, “ Are you 
fond of poetry, Miss Barclay ? ” 

u Yes. Oh, very fond of it. What made you ask ? ” 

“ I thought it wouldn’t be long before you asked me, and 
that I might just as well be first.” 

“ But I wouldn’t. It’s a missy expression which I never 
use. I only fell in with it from politeness when you used it.” 

“ I am unfortunate indeed, Miss Barclay. In the morning 
I mistook you for a child, and now I speak missyishly. How 
shall I help blundering ? ” 

8 * 


178 


BLINDPITS. 


“Oh, don’t help it. I like people that blunder. I’m 
always blundering, and I’ve no sympathy with perfect people.” 

“ Do you know many perfect people ? ” 

“No ; not many. One perhaps.” 

“ Who is that, may I ask ? ” 

“Aunt Barbara. Of course I don’t mean that I’ve no 
sympathy with her. I only mean that I’ll never be like her.” 

“ I doubt not. From what I have seen of her, I would not 
expect to find her idling away a forenoon on the ledge of a 
bridge.” 

“ No, certainly she would not ; but then remember I’m not 
at home. When I’m at home I do things.” 

“ What things ? ” 

“Oh, I read for one thing. Speaking of poetry, Mr. 
Grant, do you know Tennyson ? ” 

“ Tennyson, Tennyson ! ” repeated Mr. Grant ; “ it strikes 
me I’ve heard the name. He is a grazier, I think. Do you 
know him ? ” 

“ The grazier ? No, I don’t, and you don’t know the Lady 
Clara Yere de Yere? ” 

“ I’m quite sure I don’t know her. The only ladies in the 
peerage I know, are the Ladies Heatherdale.” 

“ That’s deplorable,” thought Bessie. “ I may drop that 
for a bad job.” Then, in a brisk tone, “ Are farms letting 
well just now, Mr. Grant ? ” 

“ Middling only,” said Mr. Grant, very gravely ; “ I’m sorry 
to say only middling.” 

“And what’s your opinion of the law of hypothec, Mr. 
Grant ? ” she asked, thinking “ That’s more in his way than 
Tennyson.” 

“ I should like tq hear yours first, Miss Barclay.” 

“I think it unjust — most unjust.” 

“ Yet something can be said for it, too.” 

“ Oh, I daresay there are few things so bad that something 
can’t be said for them. I have talked it over with Mr. Dods, 
a friend of mine ; he suffered from it. He had bought wheat 
from a farmer who turned out to have been an insolvent when 


BLINDPITS. 


179 


he sold it. Of course the landlord claimed it, and there was 
a lawsuit. I forget the particulars ; hut Mr.- Dods is an intel 
ligent man. I can trust him about a good many things.” 

“ Is he acquainted with Mr. Tennyson ? ” 

Bessie raised her big ej^es to Mr. Grant’s face, hut saw 
nothing there to prevent her answering the question in good 
faith. “ No, he isn’t ; at least not well. Tennyson is a poet, * 
you know ; indeed, the poet of the day ; but Mr. Dods is 
rather behind the age in his poetical taste. A pity for him- 
self ; otherwise,” she thought, “ he might write to please the 
editor of the Ironburgh Magazine .” 

“ It is a sad thing to be behind the age, Miss Barclay.” 

u Oh, not sad altogether ; and such people are useful. They 
keep things from going too fast, like a drag on a carriage 
going down hill, as Tories are in politics, you know.” 

u And is Mr. Dods a Tory ? ” 

“ Not at all. He is not behind in his political views. He 
is rather an advanced Liberal.” 

“ A grain-merchant in Ironburgh ? ” 

u No, he’s not in business. He is Mrs. Dods’ husband — 
the person that your friend, Mr. Richardson, lodges with.” 

“ I comprehend.” 

" Mr. Grant,” she said gravely, u I’ve understood you knew 
my father. Aunt and grandmamma sometimes speak of his 
boyhood. Could you tell me anything of him — of his last 
years? I mind nothing of either him or my mother. Did 
you know my mother ? ” and she fixed her deep dark eyes 
anxiously on Mr. Grant’s face. 

“ I never knew your mother, and I had not seen your father 
for years before he died. I only had letters from him occa- 
sionally, — business letters merely.” 

Begging letters would have been the more correct render- 
ing, but Mr. Grant could not say that in the presence of the 
lustrous eyes watching for his answer. She said no more, but 
stitched away with increased energy. u Poor thing, if I were 
to tell her he was a good-for-nothing fellow, how would she 
look ? ” thought ]|dr. Grant ; and he went away to go round 
the garden w T ith Miss Boston. 


180 


BLINDPITS. 


“ You’ve got a companion at last, Miss Boston,” he said. 

“ Ay,” said Miss Boston ; “ and she’s no just on the ordin- 
ary pattern.” 

“ I should say not. How do you find she fills the situa- 
tion?” 

“She fills it ower weel. What’s to come o’ me when she 
gangs away ? ” 

“ Don’t let her go away. That’s simple enough.” 

“ Is’t ? How lang do ye think I’ll get her keepit ? ” 

“ Oh, arrange it with her aunt. I think she would hardly 
object.” 

“ It’s no her I’m feared for. 

“ Her grandmother ? She might he made to see that it’s 
for her good, I daresay.” 

“The like o’ her is whiles coveted by folks that’s neither 
their grandmother nor aunt.” 

“ Why, she’s a mere child.” 

“ O’ seventeen, wi’ ways o’ her ain that might lure the lave- 
rock frae the lift.” 

“ I’m glad you like her so well. She amused me.” 

“ She’s a bonnie lassie, and gude as she’s bonnie, wi’ plenty 
o’ spunk and smeddum ; and she thinks, and thinks for hersel.’ 
I’m sure Barbara’s often puzzled wi’ her, for she keeps to the 
landmarks and the milestanes. I hope she’ll fa’ into gude 
hands, puir thing.” 

“I hope so,” said Mr. Grant; and he wondered how old 
women needed to be before they lost interest in matrimonial 
projects. To him Miss Boston’s fear of losing Bessie seemed 
nonsense at least for years to come. 

Next evening — for Mr. Grant 'was little in his own house, 
during the day, that is, he was in his own house for his 
office was a room in it, but he was not much beside his family 
— he again divided himself between Miss Boston and her 
companion. It was a pleasant thing for a man not accustomed 
to nave any bright young feminine inmate to put off a little 
leisure with such a creature as Bessie Barclay. 

“ I’m afraid. Miss Barclay,” he said, “ that I interfere with 


BLINDPITS. 


181 


your work. Needlework seems a passion w*ith you, and a 
young lady can hardly do anything more useful.” 

Bessie blushed. “ Mr. Grant, I’m not going to take credit 
I don’t deserve. I never sew when I can help it ; but aunt’s 
like you, she thinks it very virtuous to sew.” 

“ May I say, Miss Barclay, that I hope that’s not one of the 
subjects on which your aunt and you differ ? ” 

“Yes; just one of them. But though I think I’m right, I 
try to do as she wants me, so much so that I often have a 
guilty feeling when I’m reading. But if it’s virtuous for me 
to sew just now when we’re speaking, why shouldn’t it he vir- 
tuous for you too ? ” 

“ It would be virtuous for me, but I can’t do it. My early 
education was neglected.” 

“ But you might learn yet.” 

“ So I might, perhaps, but I like to be idle.” 

“ That’s wickeder than I am ; for though I don’t care for 
sewing, I don’t like to be idle.” 

“ Have you seen the books yet ? ” 

“ Books ? ” she said with sudden interest ; “ I thought you 
had no books here — I mean none to speak of — and I was 
thinking I would get this thing done while I was opt of temp- 
tation’s way.” 

“ You must think us tremendously behind the age.” 

“ Me, 1 didn’t. Aunt doesn’t read a book in three months, 
and she ” — 

“ Is perfect, I know. Come away then, and I’ll let you see 
our books. My sister has not guessed your tastes, or she 
would have supplied you with books.” 

He took her into a room which was nearly dark. All the 
blinds were closed, but he opened them one by one, and Bessie 
gazed about her. 

It was not a large room and it was nearly circular. Three 
windows occupied one side of it, and the other was filled with 
bookcases fitted to the wall. The tables and chairs were dark 
old wood, the latter having broad low seats and richly-carved 
backs. They were covered with deep red damask; the 


182 


BLINDPITS. 


window hangings were of the same color, and the heavy cloth 
on the table was littered with writing materials. An easy 
chair was drawn into it with its back to the window, and an 
open book was lying with a mark in it. Bessie looked at the 
mark. In bead letters was printed “ To Papa, from Mary.” 
Then she glanced at the book. It was a volume of Tenny- 
son’s poems. 

“ You were laughing at me last night, Mr. Grant,” she said. 

“ Nonsense. If I had known Tennyson, don’t you think I 
would have been too glad to say so to keep up my credit in 
the eyes of a young lady who looks into all tilings, even the 
law of hypothec ? ” 

" Oh, laugh away ! I might have known better, only I 
thought it might interest you, although I always feel provoked 
when people try to draw me out on what they think my sub- 
jects — not that I have subjects, or know many people, — only 
when I meet Mr. Pettigrew he always says, ‘ What book is 
Miss Betsy reading just now ? ’ as if I did nothing but read. 
I do no such thing.” 

“ Mr. Pettigrew will know Tennyson ? ” 

“ Not he. I don’t believe he knows Burns. He’s a most 
disagreeable man, and aunt won’t let me say it.” 

“ Then that’s another subject on which your aunt and you 
differ?” 

“We don’t differ on it, if she would say wliat she thinks, I 
know that. Miss Betsy is a most obnoxious name.” 

“ It dosen’t appear that to me, but then I’m not a man of 
taste.” 

“ Are you not ? This room doesn’t say that. I’ve read of 
rooms like this, but I never saw one before.” 

Mr. Grant smiled. 

“No grate,” she said. “ You burn logs here, on the hearth, 
as in the old baronial halls. How delightful ! ” 

“ Yes. Grates and coals are poor inventions comparatively. 
It’s a nice plan, too, to kindle the sticks by friction. Have 
you tried that, Miss Barclay ? ” 

“ Have you tried it, Mr. Grant ? ” 


BLINDPITS. 


183 


“ Well, no; Fm ashamed to say I take a lucifer when 1 
want a light/’ 

u I would like to see logs blazing on the hearth, and 
reflected in that long mirror ; tastes must have been exercised 
here by some one.” 

“ Likely enough, hut all the merit I can claim was buying 
that old furniture at the sale when the house was dismantled ; 
not these hooks though — I did not buy any hooks, only the 
bookcases — they were filled by a brother of mine who came 
here some years since to die ; he liked this room.” Bessie re 
mained quiet on the sofa where she had settled herself. 

Mr. Grant said, “You’re looking at that old black press 
behind the door, I see.” 

“ Mr. Grant ! is not that a curious old cabinet ? ” 

“ I suppose it is ; I got it as a legacy from the Marquis’s 
mother, the late Marchioness of Heatherdale, but I would 
have been as well pleased with an old kitchen dresser.” 

“ Oh, Mr, Grant ; even if it were of no value, think what 
associations must be clustered round it.” 

“ Associations could be clustered round a kitchen table, too 
and of as pleasant a kind. No saying what guilty secrets 
have been kept in that thing.” 

“ That’s the very interest attaching to it, and then it’s a 
beautiful object in the room.” 

“ I suppose you feel your mind enlarged, and your nature 
elevated looking at it ? ” 

“ Is that not the very end of beauty ? ” 

“ So it is said, but I don’t believe in the elevating nature 
of curious furniture, and china dishes, and articles of vertu, 
and fiddle-faddle.” 

“ Then, where would you stop fiddle-faddle — would you stop 
at hard-wood chairs, horn spoons for soup, and your fingers 
for solids, or where ? ” 

Mr. Grant laughed. “ Well, Miss Barclay, I wouldn’t feel 
myself less a man with that amount of accommodation, but I 
would let people all stop where they liked. I only meant to 
impress you with the fact that I’m not a person of taste. 


184 


BLINDPITS. 


There’s that hook-mark Mary wasted her time on ; I suppose 1 
should feel grateful, but the truth is, the corner of an old 
envelope suits me better when I need a mark, which is not 
often.” 

“ And you think Mary wasted her time doing this ? ” 

“ It’s very ungracious to say so, you think ? ” 

“ Rather ; a little, perhaps ; hut I often feel as if I should 
do things of that kind, although I have thought it useless 
work ; aunt says it forms industrious habits, hut I always felt 
impatient of it, and I’m glad to find that you don’t approve 
highly of it.” 

“We must not tell, we must keep these heretical opinions 
to ourselves, Miss Barclay; hut if you like to see pretty 
things, my sister must take you through Heatherburgh 
Castle ; you’ll think it an enchanted region.” 


CHAPTER XXIII. 


“You like the Grants, father and son, Pm sure, Bessie, 
don’t you ? 99 said Mary M’Vicar ; “ and Miss Grant is such 
a kind old woman too. I call old Mr. Grant quite interesting ; 
and he is very kind also.” 

“ If you won’t be angry, Mary, I would say I like old Mr. 
Grant better than Dr. Grant.” 

“ Oh, that’s because you do not know J ohn yet.” 

“ Xo, I don’t know him. He gives me a nod in the morning 
when we meet, and that’s the most I see of him ; hut I can’t 
feel at home with him. I’m quite at home with his father.” 

“ There is a slight shyness about John, just the kind of 
thing people are apt to take for coldness or pride ; hut when 
you know him better ” 

“ I don’t think he is shy ; with Miss Boston at least.” 

“ Oh, Miss Boston is a very old friend, and was his mother’s 
cousin. Wait till you know him better. His time is very 
much occupied just now helping papa, so that he can’t he 
much at home.” 

“It would not have occurred to me that he was shy,” 
thought Bessie. u I fancied he did not think it worth his 
while putting off time on me. If I am wrong, I beg his 
pardon.” 

“ And what do you think of Tom Ainslie ? ” asked Mary. 

“ I haven’t thought of him at all.” 

“ They’ve been thinking of you. Susan and he are getting 
up a picnic on your account.” 

“ On my account ? ” 


186 


BLINDPITS. 


“ Yes ; you are the great first cause ; of course the rest of 
us will enjoy it too.” 

“ They really are kind.” 

“ Yes, they’re kind, we all acknowledge that ” 

“You’re talking of the Ainslies,” said Mrs. Gascoigne — 
(Bessie was spending an evening at St. Yincent Villa) — 
“ Certainly they’re not the style of people I have been accus- 
comed to, hut I think them very meritorious. Mr. and Mrs. 
Ainslie enjoy§d themselves in their own way; the young peo- 
ple are more ambitious, and they make me their authority on 
all points of etiquette, and I am very glad to be of use to them. 
I consider people who have raised themselves in the scale 
deserve to be encouraged ; so does your papa, Mary.” 

“ Most people in the neighborhood consider them deserving,” 
said Mary. “Aunt gets a drive in Mrs. Ainslie’s carriage 
whenever she likes, which is more than she can say of papa’s 
brougham ; but then Mr. Ainslie says the brougham is part of 
papa’s business plant.” 

“ Poor man ! Mr. Ainslie is rather given to commercial 
slang,” said Mrs. Gascoigne, “ and Mrs. Ainslie’s manners 
and ideas are hardly in keeping with their present phase of 
life ; but I believe they are sterling people, and one can over- 
look a good deal in that case — at least I can ; although, other 
things being equal, I should prefer acquaintance of a different 
stamp ; but nothing can make up for the deficiencies caused 
by not moving in good society in youth.” 

“ That’s always what grandmamma says, and aunt counts a 
good deal on birth and breeding too, I know, although she 
holds out to me, that if people are good and do their duty, 
externals are of very little importance ; and when I am in a 
virtuous mood, and look closely into things, I think she’s 
right.” 

“Certainly, my dear,” said Mrs. Gascoigne; “still, when 
one has been accustomed to society where cultivation and 
refinement have gone on for generations, one misses the grace 
of it ; goodness, in the rough, jars on one.” 

“ It doesn’t jar on me,” said Mary ; “ I like the Ainslies.” 


BLINDPITS. 


187 


Next day Susan Ainslie called at Grantsburn to invite 
Bessie to the picnic. “ You know, Miss Barclay,” she said, 
her fat good-humored face dimpling all over with smiles, u this 
picnic is of Tom’s planning ; I hope it will go off well, and 
that you’ll enjoy it.” 

“ I am sure of it ; I never was at a picnic, and I am so glad 
to go.” 

“ You never were at one before ? Where have you lived all 
your days? I’ve been at so many, but they’re not always 
nice ; it depends so much on the people, and the way they’re 
planned, and, beyond everything, on the weather ; a showery 
day, or a windy day, or a cloudy day, and it’s done for; I 
don’t believe there’s such a thing as a perfect picnic.” 

“ Whatever this one is, I’m sure I’ll like it.” 

“ We’re to have young people mostly, they’re best for a 
picnic ; old people are always catching cold or something ; 
only mamma says we must have Mrs. Gascoigne, she has so 
much spirit, and mamma likes to show her a little attention. 
She is so poor, quite dependent on Dr. M’ Vicar, you know ; 
and, as mamma says, he may marry any day, and where would 
she be ? and she can always make herself agreeable, and is so 
anxious to be of any little service to us, so we must have her, 
but I think she’s the oldest of the lot,” etc. etc. 

The picnic passed off much like other picnics. Bessie had 
a great deal of enjoyment in watching the sayings and doings 
of the company, most of whom were strangers to her. The 
quiet pastoral dream-like glen, the ruined castle, and the 
scenery generally, she only got a vague idea of ; to make them 
her own she felt she would need to spend some time with 
them alone ; it was to the people she devoted her faculties. 

Mr. Tom Ainslie came for her in the morning, and brought 
her home at night, when she found two unexpected things had 
happened — Miss Boston had gone home, and Mr. Grant had 
sprained his ankle severely. He was lying on the sofa, and 
his sister was applying remedies. 

“ I’m sorry,” said Bessie ; “ is it very painful ? ” 

“ A little, but I don’t mind that, it’s the imprisonment 1 
dislike. What kind of day have you had ? ” 


188 


BLINDPITS. 


“ Delightful. Imprisonment — that’s staying in the house 
for a week or two ; that’s nothing. I am often not out for a 
fortnight except to church; to he sure men are different, I 
suppose.” 

“ Yes, they are very different,” said Miss Grant ; “ they 
lose patience at once. Women can endure a great deal, and 
say nothing about it.” 

“ I can’t help being a man,” said Mr. Grant. 

“ You should be glad it’s nothing worse, and that you have 
a doctor in the house,” said his sister. 

“ If Miss Boston hadn’t gone away — Will she expect me 
to-night? She might have stayed a little longer,” said 
Bessie. 

“So she might,” said Miss Grant; “hut John came in, 
and stupidly told her that the hoy at Blindpits was hoeing up 
all the flower-seeds ; and home she would he on the instant ; 
but she said she would only expect a call from you now and 
then till you wanted to come hack altogether.” 

“I would like to stay here too, and try to amuse you,” she 
said, looking at Mr. Grant. 

“ Then by all means stay and try it.” 

“ I don’t think it will he difficult.” 

“ That’s because you have never had to do with men my 
dear,” said Miss Grant ; “ the last time my brother was con- 
fined to the house with cold I was at my wit’s end. I wanted 
him to hem some kitchen towels, which he could have done 
quite well ” 

“ There, that’ll do,” said Mr. Grant ; “ I’ll try to behave 
better this time ; but the air of a house stifles me w r hen I’m 
in it from morning till night.” 

Mr. Grant was not prevented by his accident from being in 
his office, as that was under his own roof ; but, his business 
there done, he had no resource but his sister’s sitting-room, 
which was a hardship to a man accustomed to be on horseback 
every day of the year, and passionately fond of the exercise. 

“Now,” he said to Bessie, “how do you propose amusing 
me, and keeping me in good humor ? ” 


BLINDPITS. 


189 


“ I’ll tell you all I can do, and then you can choose. I can 
read aloud, I can play on the piano and sing, I can play hack- 
gammon and draughts, and I can speak ; or I can take my 
work and he silent, or I can disappear altogether.” 

“ That’s all ? ” 

“ Yes, that’s all, so far as I remember, that can he of any 
use to you.” 

“ I must try them all, then. My sister reads aloud, hut I 
always fall asleep under it.” 

“ Do you wish to he read to ? and do you want to go to 
sleep ? ” 

“ I don’t want to go to sleep if I can help it.” 

“ Because I can read either to make you sleep or to keep 
you awake. I’ll keep you awake ; what shall we read ? ” 

“ What say you ? Tennyson, I daresay, if you were to 
choose. But I’m not in a mood for poetry ; I really don’t care 
for poetry. I had better not trouble you ; I’ll just glance over 
the newspaper.” 

“ It’s no trouble to me to read, it’s an enjoyment. I seldom 
get any one that’ll put up with it. When grandmamma is 
able she likes to read herself, except the newspapers ; and 
there’s never time to read more than my lesson to aunt.” 

a Very well, begin.” 

“ You’ll tell me when you’re tired. When I read the paper 
to grandmamma, I read first 1 The Turf,’ and then where the 
different hounds meet ” 

“ The turf! What does she or you know about the turf? ” 

“ Oh, I always insist she likes to hear about it ; sometimes 
she’s angry, and sometimes she laughs — it’s a standing joke 
between us, and we both feel attached to it. How, Grand- 
mamma hasn’t much to take her out of herself. Shall I begin 
with the births, deaths, and marriages ? but I daresay it’s 
ridiculous to suppose a man interested in these — the leaders 
will be the thing ; ” and she plunged into the topics of the 
day, reading with spirit and point, and easy naturalness, 
stopping here and there to make some remark, critical or 
otherwise, with the queer wisdom you might expect a change- 


190 


BLINDP1TS. 


ling to be endowed with, but showing that she knew perfectly 
what she was about. Her performance was certainly a con- 
trast to Miss Grant’s monotonous sing-song, interlarded with 
yawns. At length she said — 

“ Shall I stop ? are you tired ? ” 

“ Tired ! no,” he said, looking at his watch, “but you must 
be ; why, you’ve read an hour and a half. I’ve forgotten my- 
self to let you go on so long.” 

“I don’t think that long; I haven’t been speaking loud. 
I’ve often gone on for two hours at the pitch of my voice, 
when I had the chance of the house to myself ; but that’s 
some time ago. I had certain views then, which I was forced 
to relinquish.” The large dark eyes were looking at the wall 
behind Mr. Grant, and it seemed as if she were speaking more 
to herself than to him. 

“ What views could you possibly have ; and who forced you 
to relinquish them ? ” he said. 

“Aunt did, and I’ve tried not to think of it since. I 
thought of a public career.” 

“You ! a public career! How on earth were you going to 
make yourself public ? ” 

“ I was going to read in public ; there’s surely nothing so 
surprising in that. Would there be more harm in reading to 
a thousand people than to one ? ” 

“Your aunt is one of the most sensible people I ever 
knew,” said he, warmly. 

“ I am sure of that,” she said ; “ if I hadn’t been so sure of 
that I wouldn’t have yielded ; but I gave in to her general 
sense, not to her particular sense on that subject.” 

If Mr. Grant had not been chained to the sofa, he would 
have gone walking through the room. 

“ As you’re not in training for a public career, I think you 
have done enough just now ; and you’ve kept up the attention 
of your audience remarkably well. Perhaps you would take 
your stitching, and sit in the window there ? ” 

She took her stitching, but she was idle. Her eyes wan- 
dered over the old-fashioned garden, over the fields, and woods, 


BLINDPITS. 


191 


and farm-liouses, till they reached the sea, shining in its coat 
of many colors below the evening sun, which, like old King 
Hake, was grandly sinking into the waters in a bed of fire 
and flame. 

“ I wonder,” said Dr. Grant, after he had examined his 
paternal patient professionally, and given him the news of the 
day, “ I wonder that child hasn’t gone back to Blindpits yet.” 

“ Is there any particular hurry for her going back ? ” said 
Mr. Grant. 

“ Oh, of course not,” said the doctor; “but I would have 
thought, if there isn’t as much in her, her aunt would have 
put her up to it.” 

“Her aunt hasn’t shown herself so worldly wise yet, John ; 
and I hope she would hardly lay soiled fingers on that child’s 
innocent nature.” 

“ The innocent child seems to have played her part pretty 
well as yet ; but she’ll need to look sharp if she’s to do much 
good, for the old woman is like the horse-leech about attention 
— she never says it’s enough.” 

“ I don't find her in the least exacting.” 

“ I do. Sometime since she asked me to bring from Mid- 
dleburgh, the first time I went, some particular kind of cured 
fish. I forgot them as often as I could ; and when I did bring 
them, I was about poisoned with the perfume, and had all the 
cats of the place sniffing about me. Then she saw some re- 
markable coffee advertised, and I must bring a quarter of a 
pound of it — not more till she tried it — and the train smelt 
like a coffee-mill, or plantation for what I know. I wonder 
what she’ll think of next — a polecat likely.” 

“ But you needn’t carry her parcels unless you like.” 

“ Ho ; but I like to be obliging, and I asked if there was 
anything I could do for her; and I could hardly refuse to do 
it after that.” 

“ I don’t see that ; you could have said you did not care for 
extra perfumes.” 

“ Oh, hang her ! ” said the doctor. “ And she has always 
some jelly-pot, about the size of my little finger, that I’m 


192 


BLINDPITS. 


to take and give to any one that needs it, with extraordi- 
nary injunctions to keep one end up.” 

“You must be a great favorite, John; she never employs 
me in that kind of work.” 

“ It is a disgusting turn her favoritism has taken anyway 
that young fool, Tom Ainslie, has been here to-day, I sup- 
pose ? ” 

“ Yes, he has been here every day since I got this acci- 
dent. Why do you call him a fool ? ” 

“ You’ll find out bye and bye. I think I must write to 
Graham — he’s a friend of Ainslie’s — and let him know *how 
attentive he is in coming every day to ask for your leg.” 

“Do,” said Mr. Grant; and the doctor left his indoor 
patient with a kind of grandfatherly pity for human nature. 
Here was Miss Boston, for instance, convinced that he had a 
strong personal regard and affection for her ; and here was his 
father under the ridiculous delusion that Tom Ainslie called 
every day for no end hut to inquire after his welfare. “ To 
think of the facility with which people can he imposed on!” 
said Dr. Grant to himself. 


CHAPTER XXIV. 


During tlie morning her guest hovered about Miss Grant, 
and did any little services she could for her ; then she went 
out of doors: — the world was all before her where to choose. * 
Generally she took a book with her. It is probable she was 
not particular about her book ; youth never is. It is one of 
its privileges, that books are all entertaining, people all what 
they seem to be, showers all balmy, and sunshine ever bright. 
Her favorite haunt was a quiet little glen, an hour’s walk up 
the burn, opposite the house. It was a perfect little bit of 
locked-in beauty ; and she made a seat of knowe at the under 
end of it, where the water sang at her feet in its zigzag 
journey onwards. A perfect London of insect-life sent up its 
hum round her ; now and then a sheep would stop cropping 
the grass to look at the strange object on the knoll, but quite 
without alarm, for it resumed its business shortly. There were 
cattle, too, in the distance, near enough to be the objects in 
the landscape, but not so near as to be objects of appre- 
hension, which there was no reason for their being, if the 
visitor had known, for they were placid, tranquil beings, de- 
scended -from a long line of civilised, contented, beefy ances- 
tors. 

Bessie had never met any one here hitherto. Xot far off 
was a cluster of cottages ; but there was a shorter cut from 
them to Heatherburgh than the footpath through the glen, 
and the inhabitants were not so alive to the beauties of this 
glen as to lengthen their journeys for the purpose of seeing it. 
One day, however, when she looked up from her occupation — 

9 


194 


BLINDPITS. 


she had brought a pencil and paper, and was writing to her 
aunt under the select influences of the place — she saw Tom 
Ainslie coming towards her. “ How do you do ? ” she said ; 
“ you’re the first human being I have seen here.” 

“ People are all at their work at this time of day. I dare- 
say that’s the reason.” 

“ Very likely. Do you know, I don’t think this glen much 
behind the one where we had the picnic. What a happy day 
that was ! ” 

“ Did you think so, Miss Barclay ? ” 

“ Yes, I did. Did you not ? ” 

“ Oh, yes ; but I was anxious, you know ” 

“ Ah, but I had no anxiety, you see. Being neither host 
nor hostess, I had nothing to do but enjoy myself; and I did 
it.” 

“ I was anxious about ” 

“But you needn’t have been anxious. The weather was 
capital, and everything was delightful.” 

“ That wasn’t what I was anxious about — but, but ; ” and 
he floundered and got on again with the abrupt question, 
“ When are Mary M’ Vicar and Grant to be married ? ” 

“ In the autumn, I suppose ; but I don’t think the time is 
fixed yet.” 

“ They are young,” said Mr. Ainslie, “ but I believe in 
early marriages, Miss Barclay.” 

“ So do I, and in late ones too. Perhaps you’ve noticed, in 
old-fashioned novels, all the marriages are early, but in novels 
now they are very often late, owing to want of money. I 
should think that often happens in real life ; but if a marriage 
is a true marriage, I don’t see that the age of the parties 
matters much.” 

“ But, other things being equal, you think an early marriage 
best ? ” 

“I couldn’t say. I have not thought of the subject suffi- 
ciently to have made up my mind.” 

Mr. Ainslie, young as he was, had had his flirtations in his 
time, but on this wise ; his openings were now shut as fast as 


BLINDPITS. 


195 


he made them, whereas in other cases he had found no diffi- 
culty, or very little. Being in earnest, he could hut try again. 

“ And what do you call a true marriage, Miss Barclay ? ” 

“ One that’s not false.” 

This was a rapid settling of the question, instead of a 
lengthened dilly-dallying with such an interesting subject. 

“ Perhaps you would explain your ideas a little farther, Miss 
Barclay? ” 

“I haven’t any more ideas on the subject; it’s easy know- 
ing the difference between truth and falsehood.” 

Mr. Ainslie never had so much difficulty in keeping a con- 
versation in the desirable groove. “ True, disinterested love 
is surely a most valuable thing,” he remarked. 

u Yes, it is; and unlike many valuable things, it is not val- 
uable because it’s scarce.” 

“ You think it’s not scarce ? that’s not the common idea, I 
suspect.” 

“ It’s mine, though. I’ve met with a great deal of it my- 
self, and I’ve seen a great deal of it ; and I don’t believe the 
world could be kept going on without a great deal of it.” 

“ Yet older people than we have complained sadly of the 
want of it ; and I don’t think it is so plentiful as you suppose. 
I’ve known men marry ladies with money, who wouldn’t have 
married them without it ; and yet I daresay their wives sup- 
posed they w T ere very disinterested.” 

“ They were base,” said she. “ I don’t know if true love 
could mix with such base alloy ; but I was talking of love in 
general, not particularly of lovers. I never came across a 
case of that kind till I knew Mary M’Vicar and Dr. Grant.” 

There was no want of interest or animation in Bessie’s face ; 
but the business-like way in which she traversed the tender 
topics offered for her consideration convinced the youth that 
he would get no help from her in opening the oyster of his 
affections for her acceptance ; but if he could get that length 
— the length of holding it out to her — he did not despair of 
her accepting it. Bessie had risen from her seat, and they 
had an hour’s walk before them. Now, people can say things, 


196 


BLINDPITS. 


walking under tlie open canopy of heaven, that would stick in 
their throats, perhaps, sitting within four walls. 

“ Miss Barclay,” he said, “ perhaps you will think me 
abrupt if I say ” — and he stopped. 

“ If you say what ? and what does it signify whether you 
are abrupt or not ? 99 

" If I say,” he resumed, “ that I love you truly and disin- 
terestedly, that I want to marry you, and that I don’t see why 
we should not he married when Mary M’Vicar and Grant are. 
W e won’t need to wait for money at any rate.” 

Bessie* stood still in the path dumbfoundered, and wondering 
whether she had heard aright. He stopped opposite her. She 
said — 

“ Mr. Ainslie, do you know who I am ? ” 

“ Yes, yes ; you are a relation of Miss Boston’s.” 

“ I didn’t mean that. I mean do you know me. I don’t 
know you. You surely wouldn’t marry a person you know 
nothing about ? ” 

“ I know you quite well — quite well — quite well ! ” he 
, exclaimed. 

“ Grandmamma often tells me to hold my tongue, aunt tells 
me how foolish I am, Mr. Grant asks me to spring up before 
him and have a gallop on Meg, and you want to marry me ! 

■ It’s very funny ; ” and her merry laugh rang out on the sum- 
mer air. u Don’t you think it is very funny ? ” 

u Ho,” he said ; “ I am serious enough ; and I don’t like to 
he laughed at.” 

“ I was not laughing at you ; and I’m quite serious too. 
I’m not going to marry a person I know nothing of, whatever 
you may do ; that would he disinterestedness with a ven- 
geance.” 

11 Then if I wait — wait ever so long, till you know me — I 
know you quite well ; — then will you think of me ? ” 

“ I can’t promise that ; I can’t promise — no, don’t waste 
time thinking of me, for I don’t think it — could — ever — be. 
Let us speak of something else.” 

They walked on, hut Mr. Ainslie could make nothing more 
of it, yet he did not despair. 


BLIXDPITS. 


197 


Bessie finished her letter to her aunt without saying any- 
thing of this adventure in the glen, hut she thought of it, and 
said to herself — “ Mr. Ainslie made up his mind to marry me 
in three weeks, I’ll give him six to forget me.” Mr. Ainslie, 
however, still continued to exhibit anxiety and interest in Mr. 
Grant’s disabled ankle. 


CHAPTER XXV. 


“ Yes ; wlien I was at Blindpits,” said Bessie, as she rose 
from the piano, on which she had been playing for Mr. Grant’s 
amusement — he had found out that she could do something 
more than play the “ little ” done by most ladies between this 
and the Antipodes — “ I told Miss Boston I would be back to 
her in the end of this week.” 

“ And what did she say ? ” asked Mr. Grant. 

“Why, what could she say, except that she would be glad 
to see me ? ” 

“ She could have said a good many things if she had not 
been glad ; I think you should go.” 

“ Do you really ? ” she said wistfully. 

“ Yes ; although I am sorry ; for now that my ankle is 
better, I have not only to lose you, but young Mr. Ainslie’s 
visits will stop too, I doubt.” 

Bessie blushed, but looked straight at Mr. Grant with an 
irrepressible smile in her eyes. 

“Miss Boston,” he went on, “admits only a very select 
few, so that, though he may feel much interest in her coughs 
and colds, he won’t be able to show it.” 

“Miss Boston doesn’t know the Ainslies, does she not ?” 

“No; she dosen’t know them, and doesn’t wish to know 
them.” 

“ I think she is wrong ; they are very nice people.” 

“Very; the father has brains, and has known how to use 
them ; I can’t say as much for Tom.” 

“ I think, now, you are hard on poor Tom, Mr. Grant.” 


BLINDPTTS. 


199 


“ Perhaps, after all his attention for the last month. Does 
my sister know you are going this week ? ” 

“ Oh, yes ; that’s one reason she lias gone to Ashhurn Cot- 
tage this afternoon ; as she said I was here to make tea for 
you.” 

“ Did she not want you to stay longer ? ” 

“ Yes ; she asked me to stay longer.” * 

“ But you wish to go ? I don’t wonder, you must have felt 
dull here.” 

“ You wish me to go, you say.” 

u You must have felt dull here ; no parties, nor dancing, nor 
anything of that kind. My sister is past that, you see ; I 
don’t think I ever was at it ; hut we’ll promise you some gay 
doings in the autumn.” 

u Thank you. I need gaiety, I have been so much accus- 
tomed to it.” 

“ You go to a great many parties in Ironburgh ? ” 

“ Oh, a perpetual whirl. My wonder is how I have existed 
since I came here. Don’t you know, Mr. Grant,” she went on 
“ that we live in a house that might be almost put bodily into 
this room ; that, as grandmamma says, we are quite out of 
society ; that aunt works hard ; that I work a little ? I shall 
do a great deal more when I get hack. Ah, life is too easy 
here, too luxurious ! I sometimes feel like Moses at the court 
of Pharaoh, thinking of the Israelites. If you saw the strug- 
gle for life, the squalor, the dirt, the misery in the east end of 
Ironburgh ! I don’t pretend to do any good when I’m there 
— only it seems a kind of sympathy to live among it, if one can 
do no more.” 

“ And you think that here we are all as happy as the day’s 
long?” 

“ You have pure air here, at any rate, and the working- 
people, I see, look strong and healthy. One day last winter — 
a bleak wet day it was — I was out in a poor part of the town, 
and I saw half-clad shivering-looking men, with both hands in 
their pockets, and keen, pinched, intelligent faces, going in to 
a wide passage ; in the passage was a desk-stool on which 


200 


BLINDPITS. 


stood an old soup-plate ; each as he went in put a copper in it ! 
I found they were weavers out of employment, having a pub- 
lic meeting to consider what was to be done. The coppers 
were to pay for the hall they met in. They were poor crea- 
tures, the wind seemed to go through them, and you could 
easily imagine what the homes they had left were like. I saw 
one get a job to carry a box, not a big box, Miss Boston’s 
boy would have thought nothing of it ; when somebody helped 
to get it on his back, he quivered under it like a willow-wand. 
It does seem to me a shade less selfish to live among such 
people and feel for them, than to enjoy one’s-self and ignore 
them ; and if I had got my plans carried out, I might even 
have helped them a little.” 

“ What plans ? ” 

“ Oh, the intention I had of training myself to read or sing 
in public. If I had been successful, I would have got a good 
deal of money; but I must be content to work in a small 
way.” 

“ What do you mean to do ? ” 

“ Teach music in the first instance. I don’t like it ; but 
aunt says I’ll learn to like it. I had two scholars when I came 
away. They were very fat young ladies, and they knew noth- 
ing of music, and had neither taste nor talent for it ; and oh ! 
how their hands perspired ; and they always insisted on shak- 
ing hands, and with a firm grasp. It was like clasping a half- 
wrung greasy dishclout.” 

Mr. Grant laughed. “ I never clasped a half-wrung greasy 
dishclout.” 

“ But I have. Hands of that kind are a positive misfor- 
tune ; and yet there’s a dry, arid, parchmenty hand that’s 
nearly as bad. Mr. Pettigrew has that kind, and will shake 
hands at every turn. I often threaten to hang my glove out 
at the window to air after shaking hands with him. Some 
people are repulsive.” 

“ Then, although you’d give away money to the poor, or, if 
you hadn’t that, sympathy, you wouldn’t go the length of 
shaking hands, I see ? ” 


BLINDPITS. 


201 


“ It may be wrong, but I can’t help it.” 

“You wouldn’t be so knowing in bands and some other 
things if you didn’t stay in-doors a fortnight at a time ; peo- 
ple fancy all kinds of megrims that sit in-doors. And if you 
like to take a walk with me any day, I’ll show you misery, 
destitution, and discontent, as much as you could wish ; you 
needn’t hurry from this district for want of these ; besides, I 
know people who have all material comforts, and more than 
they want, who long for something else — things, perhaps, they 
shouldn’t think of. Have you no sympathy for these ? ” 

“ They are unreasonable ; but perhaps they need it as much 
as the others.” 

“ Yes ; they’re unreasonable, irrational ” 

“ Why, there’s Miss Grant already,” said Bessie ; “ she’s 
soon home. Ho,” looking her watch, “ it isn’t so early either ; 
how quickly the evening has gone ! ” 

Hext evening, when Mr. Grant came to the sitting-room, he 
looked round as if in search of something, and said to his sis- 
ter, “ She’s not away, surely, is she ? ” 

“ Who ? — Mary M’ Vicar ? Yes ; she didn’t stay long ; 
John and she went together.” 

“ I meant Bessie — Miss Barclay — she hasn’t gone to Blind- 
pits yet ? ” 

“Ho; she was here a little ago; she doesn’t go till to-mor- 
row.” 

“ Where is she now ? ” 

“ I don’t know ; probably she has gone out.” 

“ She doesn’t generally go out at this hour ? ” 

“ She just goes out when it strikes her ; she doesn’t mind 
times and seasons. From what I’ve heard Miss Boston say of 
her aunt, I would have expected her to be better trained ; but 
she’s a nice little thing, and I asked her to stay a little longer, 
thinking it a pity she should go just at this time. It did not 
occur to me that you had had enough of her chatter, and that 
you would prefer to rest in peace after your work is over for 
the day. I was sorry I left you last night.” 

“ Don’t distress yourself. When did I say I was tired of 
9 * 


202 


BLmDPITS. 


your visitor ? Like you, I think she’s a nice little thing hut 
why is it a pity she should leave us now ? ” 

“ She told me you said she had better go, and, poor thing, 
I daresay she is vexed at that ; but the great thing is, she 
won’t have the same opportunities of meeting Tom Ainslie. 
Mary says — and Susan told her — that he is .quite in earnest ; 
it would be a good marriage for her, and I think it a pity she 
should leave us on that account.” 

“ It wouldn’t be a good marriage for her,” said Mr. Grant, 
decidedly. 

“ Why not ? ” said Miss Grant ; “ he may not be her equal 
in point of birth ; bift then she is merely a music-teacher.” 

“ Birth ! — trash ! ” said Mr. Grant, impatiently. 

“Then, what’s your objection? ” 

“ Tom is stupid, and they wouldn’t be married a week till 
she would find it out.” 

“ What about it ? she might be very happy ; a woman can 
be quite happy with a stupid husband, though I have seen 
men impatient of the stupidity of their wives.” 

“Very likely; women have powers of endurance or of act- 
ing that we have not ; meantime, let Bessie go to Blindpits.” 

Miss Grant sat in a window with her sewing, Bessie in 
another with hers, Mr. Grant lay on a sofa reading ; in defer- 
ence to his employment the ladies did not speak. Probably 
his book was suggestive, for he stopped every now and then to 
muse, and his eyes fixed themselves on Bessie’s face, that 
being the object directly in line with them. At length he 
rose and stood beside her. 

“ What are you thinking about ? ” he said. 

The summer sun was sinking, and throwing a golden cause- 
way across the sea ; she pointed to it and said, “ Do you long 
to tread that golden path of rays, and think it will lead to 
some bright isle of rest ? ” 

“No, I don’t.” 

“ Perhaps you don’t believe in isles of rest. I’ll tell you 
what I was thinking of, nothing very pleasant. I read in the 
newspapers to-day a letter to his friends from a man in prison 


BLINDPITS. 


203 


for murder; he tells them he never thought to. be inside a 
prison, hut that it is a world full of cares and trouble ; he fun- 
nily overlooks his own share in his trials, and makes the world 
responsible. Now, I have my trouble, but I’m not like him, I 
know that I have brought it on myself,” and she looked shylj 
at Mr. Grant. 

“ Trouble ! ” he said ; u your troubles must be small as yet; 
they’ve never cost you a night’s sleep, I wager.” 

“ Not a whole night’s sleep, perhaps ; but I didn’t sleep 
very well last night.” 

“ What hindered you sleeping last night ? ” 

“ I wanted to amuse you when you couldn’t get out, and it 
occurred to me I had overdone the business and bored you.” 

u How did that occur to you ? ” 

“ You approved so warmly of my going at once to Blind- 
pits.” 

“ And that kept you from sleeping ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“ You lay awake thinking of that ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“I wouldn’t have given you credit for being so stupid. 
Bessie,” he went on, “ you haven’t bored me, but my sister 
and I are responsible to your aunt for your safe keeping while 
here, and I think you’ll be safer at Blindpits.” 

“ I don’t understand. What danger is there here ? What 
danger can there be here ? ” 

“ We have a visitor here daily, sometimes twice daily.” 

11 Is it Mr. Ainslie ? ” she said, with a sudden blush ; “ I 
had quite forgotten him. Is he the danger? That’s no 
danger. I could live here a hundred years without that being 
a danger.” 

Mr. Grant smiled at her quick earnestness. u I am glad to 
hear it,” he said. 

“ And I’m glad I haven’t pestered you,” said she. 

“ Bessie,” he said, “ you’ve read plenty of novels and trash, 
I fancy ; but they have not spoilt you yet. ? * 

“ Have they not ? How do you know ? ” 


204 


BLINDPITS. 


“ Never mind liow I know ! Then, as there’s no danger 
here, yon needn’t go to-morrow.” 

“ Yes, I shall go.” 

" Has your aunt told you to go ? ” 

“ No ; she didn’t say anything about it.” 

u Then why are you anxious to go ? ” 

“ I’m not very anxious to go.” 

(e You ought to be.” 

« Why?” 

“ Because Miss Boston has a great deal of money, and if 
you ” 

“ Stop ! ” said she ; “ don’t say that, or I’ll think grand- 
mamma’s opinion of you the right one after all.” 

“ What is her opinion ? ” 

• Bessie’s face grew very warm, and she looked down. “I 
needn’t tell you ; grandmamma broods over things till she 
makes herself believe anything ; and I have thought so differ- 
ently — oh, so differently ! since I knew you.” 

“ But if I recommend you to go to Blindpits and make 
yourself agreeable, your grandmamma would think that dis- 
interested, surely ? ” 

“ Possibly she might ; but I would think you base. Aunt 
$nd I know the value of money pretty well, but we never 
could sink so low as that. But you couldn’t really mean it ? ” 
and, looking up, she met Mr. Grant’s eyes full of amusement. 

“ Ah, I might have known it ! I’m very simple to walk into 
the traps you lay for me ; but I’ll take care next time.” 

“ It’s you who deal in traps, not I ; but I had better make 
this place a trap and keep you here. I don’t see why I should 
run the risk of losing Miss Boston’s money by letting you 
loose to try for it.” 

u Seriously, Mr. Grant, Miss Boston lias as good as told mo 
that I am not to get any of her money.” 

“ What did she say ? ” 

11 It was when she sent for the piano ; she said I was not to 
forget the way to get my living in her house. She would not 
have said that, you know, if she had meant to give me any 


BLINDPITS. 


205 


money, for in that case I would not have needed to teach 
music.” 

“ J ust so ; that’s a very logical deduction, I think.” 

“ It’s the only meaning the remark had, at any rate ; but 
she has been exceedingly kind, and I shall be able to earn 
money for myself. Indeed, looking back along her life and 
Aunt Barbara’s, I had rather be aunt than Miss Boston ; only 
I can’t expect ever to be so good as aunt.” 

Next day Mr. Grant drove Bessie to Blindpits ; and no 
doubt he must have felt a certain glow of satisfaction. In 
placing the fruit on a shelf so thoroughly out of reach, he was 
doing his duty by her aunt; and unquestionably, if Miss 
Barclay had known, she would have felt very grateful. When 
he returned, his sister congratulated him. 

“Well,” she said, “you won’t have that child to distract 
your attention this evening from anything you want to do.” 

“ No,” he said shortly. 

“ She was a nice child of her age, too,” pursued Miss Grant. 
“ I liked to see her flitting about.” 

“ Did you ? Was she useful to you in any way ? ” 

“ Oh, I never expect much from girls like her. They are 
little more than children. I remember Mr. Bichardson, poor 
man ! used to say, he never considered a woman a woman till 
she was thirty fully.” 

“ He should have said fifty when he was at it.” 

“ That would have perhaps been going too far ; but I have 
often wondered to see men, not young, marry mere girls. If I 
could suppose the absurdity of my marrying a boy of eighteen, 
he could never be a companion for me ; we should have noth- 
ing in common.” 

“ I should say not, very decidedly not,” said Mr. Grant, 
laughing. 

“ Yet I have know women do as outrageous a thing as 
that.” 

“ They would need a good supply of hair-dye and crowfoot- 
ointment,” 

“ It must be a wretchedly false position.” 


206 


BLINDPITS. 


“Like the successive wives of the Wandering Jew, who 
grew wrinkled and grey while he bloomed on in perennial 
youth — rather trying. If he had grown old, and they had 
kept young, it would have been a better arrangement.” 

“ It would have been a different arrangement, but there’s 
not much to choose between them.” 

“ So be it. I think Tom Ainslie wouldn’t thank you and 
me if he knew of our inhospitality.” 

“ He wouldn’t thank you. I wanted Bessie to stay on his 
very account. I thought and still think it a suitable match ; 
however, if it is to be, it will be. I count your objection no 
objection ; a respectable stupid man is as safe a companion for 
a woman on the journey of life as I know.” 

“But safety is not the chief object of a journey; people 
want enjoyment, and to see what’s to be seen on the road.” 

“ But clever men are so apt to get off the right road.”' 

“ Hot more than stupid men, surely.” 

“Yes, than good stupid men. John,” she said to Dr. 
Grant, who came in at the moment, “ your father thinks Tom 
Ainslie not a good enough match for our late visitor.” 

“ Who’s that ? Oh, the girl from Ironburgh. Late ! — 
where has she gone ? ” 

“ Back to Blindpits.” 

“ Hot good enough ! — there’s no accounting for tastes. 
According to Mary, who has it from his sister, Ainslie despairs 
of reaching such, a piece of perfection ; and Graham, too, is 
smitten with her charms, although he denies it, being faithful 
to the memory of the divine Sara. I must say I haven’t been 
dazzled myself.” 

“It’s not everything that dazzles you, John,” said his 
father. “ What reason have you for thinking that Graham — 
for believing what you said of Graham ? ” 

“ Hone, except that having missed one absurd project, he is 
likely to take up with one more absurd if it fall in his w^ay ; 
and here he would get, not only his wife, but her grandmother 
and excellent aunt, to do for with his own right hand. He 
was often in their house last winter.” 


BLINDPITS. 


207 


“ Was lie ? ” said Mr. Grant, musingly. 

- “ To be sure be was ; but, poor fellow ! He’ll be cut out 
again likely.” 

“ Possibly not, John. If your father approves of the thing, 
he might do a good deal to bring it about. Had you any idea 
of this, James, when you sent her out of Ainslie’s way ? ” 

“ Ho, I hadn’t,” said Mr. Grant, impatiently. “ You don’t 
suppose that I am going to dabble in match-making, do you ? ” 
“ You needn’t be so angry, James. I only thought ” — 

“It doesn’t matter. I’m not angry.” 


CHAPTER XXVI. 


Me. Grant’s kind consideration for Bessie, and loyalty to 
the trust reposed in him by her aunt, were not perfectly 
successful. Mr. Ainslie got his mother and sister to call at 
Blindpits, on which occasion Miss Boston shrouded herself in 
the mantle of her old nobility, and never returned the call, 
nor made any excuse, such as age or infirmity, for not return- 
ing it. Mrs. Ainslie, who, amid her wealth, had now and then 
a lively sense of her origin, was overawed, and felt as a noble 
of 'the First Empire might have done in the presence of the 
ancient noblesse, or as American shoddy in the saloon of an 
English peer. If Miss Boston had been really as poor as her 
surroundings indicated, it would have been different ; but she 
was not only rich, but she was altogether free from the tyranny 
of Mrs. Grundy — Mrs. Grundy, who stood over poor Mrs. 
Ainslie, and ruled her with a rod of iron. Miss Ainslie was 
differently affected; she was greatly tickled, and reproduced 
the scene, with considerable effect, for the edification of Mrs. 
Gascoigne. This snubbing of Mrs. Ainslie was a proceeding 
quite unworthy of Miss Boston’s age and mental capacity, not 
to mention her pretensions to be a lady ; and she knew it. 
Bessie’s worldly wisdom was shown in the remarks she made 
on it to her. 

“ Aunt,” she said, “ Why were you so stiff and short to the 
Ainslies to-day ? ” 

“ Because I dinna want them here, and they ken that.” 

“ I must say you did not take a very ladylike way of show- 
ing it.” 


BLINDPITS. 


209 


“ Maybe no ; I lia’e nae patience wi’ folk pushing themselves 
in where they’re not wanted.” 

“ I felt for Mrs. Ainslie ; the next time you’ve an operation 
of that kind to perform, I think I’ll withdraw.” 

“ Ye can please yersel’ ; but as lang as this house is mine, 
I’ll do as I like in it without asking your advice.” 

“ Miss Boston ! ” 

“ Things have come to a pass if I’m to welcome ilka servant 
woman here that married a man wi’ siller,” pursued the lady, 
her temper rising like the wind on a gusty night. “ It wad 
set her better to bide at hame, and look after her house and 
her bairns, than drive about the country handing in cards ; 
it’s aneuch to put cards out o’ the fashion ; but there wadna 
be muckle ill done if it did ! ” 

This was the first peep Bessie had had of the cloven foot, 
and it silenced her. Miss Boston had been reading before the 
unfortunate subject was mentioned, and she resumed her 
occupation. Bessie felt sorry at her part in raising the whirl- 
wind; but it did not occur to her that she might have 
damaged her fortunes thereby. Next morning Miss Boston 
said to her, u If you wish to ask the Ainslies here, you may 
do it.” 

u I wish ! ” I would never think of it even if I did wish 
it, wdiich I really don’t. They are very nice people ; but I 
have no wish to ask them here. It was very impertinent and 
thoughtless to speak as I did yesterday ; and I’m sorry for it, 
aunt.” 

“ Weel, I think ye met yer match ; but ye can ask them if 
ye like ; my bark’s waur than my bite whiles.” 

u Thank you ; I have no wish of the kind.” 

“ I’m glad to hear it. The folk ha’e credit in thriving and 
behaving weel, sae far as I ken ; and I think I could thole 
them if they werena sae weel pleased wi’ themselves ; but 
their crouseness is something by ordinar’.” 

Tom Ainslie, however, was not to be daunted by eccentric 
conduct on the part of a queer old woman, and he called 
several times at Blindpits ; but although he varied the hour oi 


210 


BLINDPITS. 


his visits, Miss Barclay was always out ; and when he sent in 
his card to Miss Boston, the answer was she was engaged. 
He watched outside a considerable time before he waylaid 
Bessie ; but then she was as frank and pleasant as ever, so 
that he dismissed the angry suspicion he had been nursing, 
that she planned to avoid him. 

“ I was sorry I was so often out when you called, Mr. 
Ainslie,” she said cheerily. “ You mustn’t call again. That 
sounds inhospitable ; but Miss Boston receives no one but a 
few very old friends ; and her ways must not be broken in on 
on my account.” 

“ Nonsense. What business has she to have ways of that 
kind ? ” 

“ Perhaps, when we’re as old as she is, we’ll find that out.” 

“ But it’s hard. Pve hardly an opportunity of seeing 
you.” 

“ As I have plenty of my own company, you can’t expect 
me to sympathise with that hardship.” 

“ Then it doesn’t signify your not seeing me ? ” 

“ Oh, yes ; it does. I like to see you very well ; but 
although I can’t ask you to Blindpits, it doesn’t matter 
much.” 

“ Does it not ? How are you ever to know me if we never 
meet ? ” 

“ Oh, but we’ll meet somewhere, no doubt.” 

“ Where ? ” he said eagerly ; “ are you going back to 
Grantsburn ? ” 

“ No, I have no thought of that just now.” 

“You see them often enough. I suppose old Mr. Grant is 
a daily visitor ? ” 

“Not quite. Why do you call him old Mr. Grant; it’s 
ridiculous.” 

“ He’s as old as my father ; but I’ll call him anything that 
pleases you.” 

“It doesn’t matter to me except as a matter of fact. It 
conveys a false impression.” 

“Palse or not false, it’s of precious little consequence. 


BLINDPITS. 


211 


Don’t you think the old lady might break through her rule ? 
we could be in a different room, you know. We don’t need to 
bother her.” 

“ She might break through her rule, probably, hut I 
wouldn’t — would never think of it. I am going into thin 
house with a message, so good-bye ; ” and she shook hands 
and disappeared so suddenly that Mr. Ainslie could hardly 
believe his eyes. 


CHAPTER XXVII. 


It was now observed by the public that Mr. Grant redoubled 
his attentions to the lady of Blindpits, no doubt with the view 
of counteracting the opposition influence. A few — a very few 
— declared they had not thought Mr. Grant capable of it. 
Misses Stark, who never spoke ill of any one, and, uncon- 
sciously following a fashion of the day, were in the habit of 
white-washing even conspicuous sinners, declared — or Miss 
J ane did, that she was very much afraid that a worldly spirit 
was creeping in and paralyzing good in quarters the most 
unexpected. Dr. M Vicar rubbed his hands and looked 
important, and said, a We shall see -what we shall see.” His 
daughter, when she became aware of the insinuations, was 
shocked, and said to her betrothed — “ John, I feel quite indig- 
nant at the idea of people talking so of your father.” 

11 It’s not like him,” said John; “ but there’s no denying 
that lie’s much oftener at Blindpits than he used to be. I 
think he’s roused at the vile trick these Ironburgh people are 
trying to play — people Miss Boston neither knew nor cared 
about — sending that girl to flatter and cajole her.” 

“ John, John, you’re surely not thinking "what you’re say- 
ing ; these people stand in the same relation to Miss Boston 
that you do ; and as for Bessie Barclay playing a vile trick, 
you’re joking.” 

“ It’s all very well for you, Mary, to think everybody nice, 
and what they should be ; but you’ve a deal to learn yet ; if 
you’d been out in the world as much as I have you would 
know better.” 


BLINDPITS. 


213 


“I don’t want to know better, John,” said Mary, sorrow- 
fully ; “ I would rather not know better ; but I am sure the 
Barclays are good.” 

Mrs. Gascoigne laughed. Mrs. Gascoigne could afford to 
laugh now. She had given up the idea of being Mrs. Grant. 
She had never wanted the consciousness that it was a forlorn 
hope ; and she could see clearly, being a citizen of the world, 
with hard common sense ; and in this instance she saw cor- 
rectly, but she only laughed. From being a woman with hard 
common sense, and perfectly able and accustomed to elbow her 
way in the world, Mrs. Gascoigne had transformed herself 
into the shrinking delicate lady, barely able to think for her- 
self, and not at all able to act for herself. A change had come 
over her, even the metallic ring of her voice had softened. 
She called at Blindpits, and mystified Miss Boston. When 
she went away, Miss Boston said, u Bessie, what’s come ower 
the woman ? What in the world’s come ower the woman, 
think ye ? ” 

“ I don’t know ; she’s only pleasanter and in better spirits 
than usual. She is elegant; but she was always that.” 

The mystery was in the ch^salis form only a very short 
time, when it emerged in full butterfly garb as a piece of really 
racy news for the public of Heatherburgh. Dr. M’Vicar’s 
widowed sister was about to replace the long-lost lieutenant. 
A brother of Mr. Ainslie’s, a little fat man — nearly as broad 
as he was long, but who, like his brother, was wealthy — met 
the tall elegant widow, saw the miniature, heard of the 
untimely death and honorable funeral, was anything but sur- 
prised to hear that Mrs. Gascoigne had been the idol of every 
circle in which she had moved, did not let his imagination (if 
he had one) run riot as to the causes that had induced the fair 
lady to withdraw from the numerous aristocratic friends who 
besought the privilege of her company, and to bury herself in 
the comparative obscurity of Heatherburgh ; and finally, 
thought himself the most fortunate of men in securing the 
frank stylish widow as his wife. 

Undoubtedly Mr. Peter Ainslie was not all that Mrs. Gas- 


214 , 


BLINDPITS. 


coigne could have wished ; hut he was wealthy and respect- 
able ; it is only justice to her to say, that she would not hav6 
married even a wealthy man had he not been respectable. 
His origin had been very humble, and, what was more annoy- 
ing, he bore conspicuous marks of that origin, and she had 
something to do teaching him all that is due to a lady deli- 
cately nurtured; but he was good-natured and kindly, and 
very well disposed to humor her. As he was older than his 
brother, his wife was Mrs. Ainslie, the other Mrs. Samuel, and 
this was satisfactory so far. It was something to escape being 
called Mrs. Peter. Mr. Peter never discovered his wife’s want 
of sensitiveness or womanly tenderness, which made her 
repulsive to Mr. Grant — it is such a mercy that tastes differ ! 
— and she was a good wife, and took her place at the head of 
the connection, and kept it, in virtue of being a “real ” lad}’’; 
and ruled, and directed, and pushed for them all ; although 
there are people who recoil from a pushing lady, who would 
fraternize at once with a good plain man from the ranks. Mr. 
Ainslie, however, never saw a fault in his wife ; and whatever 
she thought and felt, she had the good sense to know when 
she was well off ; so that the marriage, though got up in haste, 
was never repented of at leisure. 

This marriage took place before Mary M’ Vicar’s, and had 
the effect of hastening hers. Before, it had been intended 
that the young couple should take up house separately ; but 
now, what so natural or convenient as that Hr. Grant should 
draw in his chair at St. Vincent Villa ? That being the case 
there was nothing to delay the marriage, but every reason for 
furthering it, — everything but Bessie Barclay’s elaborate pieco 
of needlework, which never seemed to get much farther on. 
It is true she took it up always when Mr. Grant paid his daily 
visit, for she had given up chatting so continuously to him ; 
and, indeed, it was unnecessary, for Miss Boston had a good 
deal to say, and she sewed diligently, by fits and starts, while 
he remained ; but generally time passed as in a dream, and 
she had nothing to show for it. Aunt Barbara could guess 
that she was very idle ; but, in consideration that she was in. 


BLINDPITS. 


215 


the country, gaining health and strength, she winked at this 
time of- idleness. 

So Bessie took long walks and dreamed, practised music and 
dreamed, heard Miss Boston and Mr. Grant talking and 
dreamed; in truth it seemed as if she had been rapt away 
from her former life into the forgetfulness and lazy bliss of 
dreamland. She lost sight of the close little flat in Ironburgh, 
of her querulous grandmamma,' of the simple Miss Bobbie ; 
even Aunt Barbara was not so often in her thoughts ; and Mr. 
Bods and his manuscripts, erewhile one of her strongest 
interests and excitement^, were only recalled when the new 
number of the Ironburgh Magazine came. 

Mrs. Gascoigne, or rather Mrs. Ainslie, having got the 
honey-month over comfortably, if not rapturously, had re- 
turned with her husband to St. Vincent Villa, and was throw- 
ing herself, body and soul, into her niece’s affairs and wedding. 
Susan Ainslie and Bessie were the bride’s confidential friends, 
and the four ladies held many palavers before everything was 
settled. But even at these interesting meetings Bessie caught 
herself dreaming. To three of the ladies the matter of ap- 
parel seemed a very important one indeed. Bessie wondered, 
and thought if she were going to be married she would leave 
her clothes to the dressmaker. But then she thought further, 
the Bible says, “ Can a bride forget her ornaments ? ” To be 
sure the Bible is speaking of Eastern women, who were 
treated as toys, and had nothing but toys to occupy themselves 
with ; but she was mistaken in her views on this subject. It 
will be a sad thing for the world when women lose their 
interest in dress ; only, a number of calamities will happen 
before that. 

One day Mary had the bridegroom’s present to show T — a 
gold watch w'hich had been his mother’s. It was looked at 
without remark, till Mary herself said, “ John would have got 
a new one ; but he has a regard for that. He thought I would 
also ; it is a feeling that does him honor.” 

“ To-be sure,” said her aunt; “ and it is so like Br. Grant.” 
Then, when Mary left the room for a minute, u Anything to 
save his purse.” 


216 


BLINDPITS. 


“ An old turnip ! ” said Susan. 

“ And here,” said Mary coming back, “ is his papa’s pres- 
ent,” and she handed two cases in which glittered, on white 
satin, a beautiful and valuable bracelet and brooch, in the 
fashion of the day. 

“ Bid old Mr. Grant send you these ? ” exclaimed Susan. 
“ I must say he has come out handsomely.” 

“ Has he not ? ” said the elder lady ; “ but it’s what might 
have been expected.” 

“ I wouldn’t have expected it,” said Susan ; “old people are 
apt to forget what a girl would like.” 

“And this is from Miss Grant,” said Mary, displaying a 
pretty necklace and locket. 

“Nonsense !” cried Susan; “I settled long ago that she 
would give you an immense family Bible.” 

“ She has given me nothing so precious, you see,” said 
Mary. 

“ But something that’s cost her a great deal more, my dear,” 
said Mrs. Ainslie. “ See ! Bessie is lost in admiration of Mr. 
Grant’s present.” And she laughed. “ Don’t you envy Mary 
of her generous father-in-law ? ” 

“ Envy will do no good,” said Susan, “ for he can’t be her 
father-in-law.” 

“ Envy ! Not I. I envy no one,” said Bessie. 

“ I suppose,” said Susan, “ you’re above trinkets.” 

“Not so much that, as they are above me.” 

“ Bo you know, Mary,” said Susan, “Tom is going abroad? 
papa wishes him to travel. If your wedding hadn’t been so 
soon, he couldn’t have danced at it.” 

“He’ll enjoy that,” said Bessie; “I almost envy him of 
that.” 

“He’s not very bright about it ; besides, papa wishes him 
to attend one of the German universities for a season. Papa 
thinks a liberal education such an advantage.” 

“ So it is,” said Mrs. Ainslie. “ Tom will come back learned 
in all the learning of the Egyptians.” 

“ I don’t think papa means him to go to Egypt.” 


BLINDPITS. 


217 


11 Does he not ? ” said the new aunt, with a glitter in her 
eye. 

The guests at Mary M’Vicar’s wedding were more numerous 
than select. The mention of one person who must he asked sug- 
gested others who ought to he asked in case they should take 
offence. Neither of the doctors was a man to risk giving of- 
fence ; and as it would he a solitary occasion, the guests were 
very numerous. 

Susan and Bessie were bridesmaids, and Graham Richardson 
was groomsman. Mary M’ Vicar was one of those people who 
vary very much in appearance, and unfortunately, on this day, 
she was evidently not in good look. Of the two girls near 
her, Susan was justly described as sonsy. She had a fresh- 
colored, broad, smiling face, with the large mouth and full lips 
indicative of good-nature. But when Bessie swept past him 
to her place, for half-an-instant Graham did not recognise her, 
and he said to himself, “ What beautiful girl is that ? n He 
had never seen her except in cheap and rather sad-colored rai- 
ment (for Miss Barclay studied economy chiefly in dress), close 
up to the throat and down to the wrists. But on this occas- 
ion Miss Boston had trusted Mrs. Ainslie with her dress ; and 
in that department Mrs. Aiuslie was to be trusted. The ex- 
citement of the occasion had given color to her cheeks, and 
her dark translucent eyes had an added depth of loveliness from 
having been so much in the open air recently. A little smile 
was on her face ; for she could not help thinking of herself 
as Cinderella. u All these people ” she thought, “ will fancy 
I’m a lady of the first magnitude. If they saw me in my old 
brown gown, hammering the notes into the heads of the 
Misses Eraser ! I hope my grandeur won’t drop off me when 
the clock strikes.” But considering she had never been at a 
wedding, and that she had better improve the opportunity, she 
began to look quietly about ; and first she met Mr. Grant’s 
eyes ; and a smile came into his face. No doubt it was a grat- 
ifying day to him — deeply so — for he was witnessing the 
happy marriage of his only child. Then she encountered the 
10 


218 


BLINDPITS 


gaze of Tom Ainslie, into which, in consideration of his im- 
minent travels, he was trying to throw a volume of meaning. 

In the evening most of the company of the morning re- 
assembled, and Graham engaged her immediately to dance. 
At a pause he said, looking round, 

“ Plenty of youth and joys here.” 

“I suppose this is cut with a hammy knife, is it?” she 
said. 

“ Hammier than those we’re accustomed to in Berwick 
Street, or you have up at Blindpits.” 

“ Well, it may he. An evening like this is good seasoning ; 
hut it would he wearing out often.” 

“ What ! ye’re not tired already ? — and I fancy it’s your 
first dancing party.” 

“Yes; but I’m not tired. Do you think Mr. Grant will 
dance to-night ? ” 

“ I don’t know. Hot likely ; at his age I fancy people don’t 
care for dancing.” 

She did not speak again ; and next pause he said, “Bessie, 
why do you look so grave and absent ? ” 

“ Do I look grave and absent ? ” 

“ Yes ; is it because a certain gentleman is going off on his 
travels ? ” 

“ Mr. Richardson, don’t he absurd.” 

“ Hot at all. He goes very reluctantly ; and I don’t won- 
der.” 

“ What are you all doing in Berwick Street ? ” 

“ What were we all doing when you forsook us ? we’re 
doing the same thing yet, except that I’m here, and am going 
to he here for a month. Don’t you see how ill I look ? I told 
our people I absolutely needed a month’s play. That was a 
‘ short method with deists,’ and it succeeded.” 

“ You don’t really mean that you’re not well ? ” 

“ Why not ? I’ve as good a right to he ill at a time as 
other people. What would Berwick Street say if it saw you 
floating about in this gauzy film? Was this robe ordered 
direct from fairyland ? ” and he touched the ethereal fabric. 


BLINDPITS. 


219 


“ The good old fairy at Blindpits had it from a spider’s loom, 
I daresay. I would like Mr. Dods to see me in it, and Miss 
Dobbie.” 

“ Yes ; Mr. Dods would strike off a poem to Miss B. B. on 
her first hall. Bve a mind to try it myself.” 

“ Do,” she said ; “ I would like to see any of your ideas 
in black and white.” 

“ Ah, I don’t promise you ideas, only jingle.” 

When the dance was over, Mr. Grant came up to them. 
“ I hope you are enjoying yourselves,” he said. 

“ I am,” said Graham ; “ hut I don’t answer for Miss Bar- 
clay. She’s a philosopher, and mustn’t he judged by ordinary 
rules.” 

“ What do you say, Bessie ? ” asked Mr. Grant. 

“ I say Mr. Richardson is in very high spirits. He used 
often to be in a state of sublime melancholy when I knew him 
first. His affairs in Ironhurgh must he prospering.” 

u You have a powerful imagination,” said Graham, feeling 
the blood stealing into his face. 

u Could you imagine me dancing, then, Miss Barclay,” said 
Mr. Grant, “ with you for a partner ? ” 

“ Yes,” and she rose at once ; “ I was just wondering if you 
danced.” 

“ I don’t often do it ; but to-night I have a strong inclina- 
tion to a make fool of myself. You have known Graham for 
some time ? ” 

“ Oh, yes ; he used to come to us pretty frequently last 
winter, and we all liked him. I wondered he came so often 
for” 

u For what ? ” 

“ Perhaps I shouldn’t say it ; but I was told there was a 
lady in Ironhurgh he wanted to marry.” 

“ I’ve heard something of that.” 

(l Then it is true ? I used to think, when he was dull, that 
there was some obstacle in his way: and I was glad to see 
him in such spirits to-night.” 

“ He is certainly in good spirits.” 


220 


BLINDPITS. 


u But every one seems that. Grandmamma talks of being 
in society. I suppose this is society ? ” 

“ It is our society, at any rate.” 

“ But not the kind in which the ladies are all beautiful and 
accomplished, and the elderly gentlemen are in Parliament, 
and the young ones borrow money on post-obits ? ” 

“ You’ve been reading a novel in high life, Bessie.” 

(C I’ve read plenty of them ; hut I don’t altogether believe 
in these very extraordinary women. They must have been 
human after all.” 

“Very human indeed.” 

“ I wonder if rich common people are as anxious to get in 
among the nobility as these hooks say. I can hardly think it. 
I know I could live my own life on my own plan, independent 
of any human being.” 

“ All, but people are not all philosophers. 

“ It’s a pity, then. What sort of a man is the Marquis of 
Heatherburgh ? ” 

“ A good upright man.” 

“ But not intellectual ? ” 

“ Hot very, perhaps.” 

“ To he sure intellect doesn’t occur oftener among the no- 
bility than other people, I suppose. I thought he looked 
weak. Miss Stark pointed him out to me one day at the sta- 
tion. He happened to take off his hat, and I thought his face 
indicated weakness. He is tall, round-shouldered, and fresh- 
colored, and looks uncommonly well washed and brushed. 
Gentlemen in first-class carriages generally give one the im- 
pression that they are recently out of a bath. I suppose that’s 
why they call common people the unwashed ? — Who is that 
dancing with Mr. Bichardson ? ” 

“ First, what do you think of her ? ” 

“ She has weak eyes, hasn’t she ? She is not beautiful, but 
she is striking.” 

“ Striking ! — she would not feel complimented — such as she 
avoid being striking.” 

The dance was over ; and Bessie perceived an elderly gen- 


BLTNDPITS. 


221 


tleman making his way towards them, bowing and shaking 
hands as he came. He shook hands with Mr. Grant, and said 
— “Here I am, you see, Grant; and my daughter couldn’t 
resist coming either. Pray introduce me to your partner.” 

“ Certainly — Miss Barclay.” 

“ You won’t object to dance with an old man, Miss Bar- 
clay ? May I have the honor ? ” 

She bowed. If Mr. Grant had mentioned the new-comer’s 
name she had not observed it ; but it did not matter much. 

“ You’re a stranger here, Miss Barclay ? ” said her unknown 
partner. 

“ Yes ; I live in Ironburgh.” 

“ I thought you couldn’t be a native. I think I know all 
the Heatherburgh faces. It’s a great city, Ironburgh, or 
thinks so at least.” 

“ It can hardly help thinking so.” 

“ Quite true ; it can’t help it. It is a well-pleased city.” 

“ Is it ? ” she said, innocently. 

“ Don’t you think so ? ” 

“ I don’t know much about it. I live in the east end. 
The people are not too well pleased there, I think.” 

“Are they not ? — Well, it’s a pity, for they would be hap- 
pier if they were.” 

“ But how can people be pleased who have very little to 
make them so.” 

“By being contented. The great want among the lower 
classes is a want of cheerful contentment. Why, they get 
food and clothing — all they need. Which of us gets more ? 
And they have no care — none.” 

Bessie wondered who he could be that had such cheerful 
views, and thought poverty had no cares ; but the dance being 
over, she forgot her curiosity, and it was not till she was driv- 
ing to Grantsburn, wdiere she was to stay till next day, and 
was listening to Miss Grant and Graham discussing the party 
that she asked Mr. Grant who the old gentleman was she had 
danced with. 

“ Did you not know ? I thought you knew.” 


222 


BLINDPITS. 


“ No ; I didn’t catcli liis name.” 

“ You said you saw him at the station.” 

“ At the station? — You don’t mean he was the Marquis of 
Heatherburgh ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

She hurst into a fit of merry laughter. “ And I’ve reallj 
danced with a live Marquis. I saw people looking at us ; and 
I began to wonder if my gown had met with an accident.” 

“Did you not see him dancing with Mrs. Gascoigne — 1 
mean Ainslie — before he danced with you ? ” said Graham. 

“ Poor woman ! I hope it did not recall the Lieutenant’s 
funeral, and the titled people who attended it, to her mind,” 
said Miss Grant. Whether she said this in good faith ; or 
whether she was a little sore that the nobleman had not 
danced with the bridegroom’s aunt rather than the bride’s, 
cannot he known. 

“ No harm if it did,” said Graham. “ I suppose a woman 
may think of her first husband, although she has a -second.” 

“ I don’t see how she could help it,” said Bessie ; “ but I 
don’t think Mrs. Ainslie’s thoughts were sad to-night. In- 
deed, she and I will date from this occasion for the period of 
our natural lives, I should think.” 

“ What did his lordship say, Bessie ? ” asked Graham ; 
“ what did he say ? ” 

“ Let me think ; he said Ironburgh was a great city, a well- 
pleased city ; that if every one would be contented every one 
would be happy ; and that every one gets food and clothes, 
and doesn’t need more.” 

“ All true statements,” said Graham. 

“ Uncommonly true,” said Bessie. 

“Now, you young critics, stop there,” said Mr. Grant; 
“ the Marquis is a good man — in many respects an example to 
his class.” 

“ There now,” said Graham, “ the press is gagged. We 
might as well be in Prance. But I had my share of the hon- 
ors too. Lady Jane Heatlierbell first danced with M’ Vicar 
and then with me ; and she’s a nice girl and doesn’t pretend 
to be more.” 


BLINDPITS. 


223 


“ Upon the whole/’ said Miss Grant, u Mary and John 
have every reason to think that their wedding has gone off 
remarkably well.” 

“ If it goes on as well as it has gone off, they’ll do,” said 
Graham. 


CHAPTER XXVIII. 


Next morning Graham was in the Round Room, as it was 
called, hunting for a hook he wanted, when Mr. Grant came 
to him, and after a little talk, said, “ Graham, I’ve been think- 
ing it might he a good thing for you to go to the Continent 
with Tom Ainslie. I daresay you would like it ? ” 

Graham hesitated a little — “ You are very kind, sir,” he 
said. 

“ I don’t know that lam; at least there’s no use speaking 
about it. There’s some money to make what use of you like ; 
and I think you should go with Ainslie. You would make 
more of your time that way than hanging about here. But 
please yourself, of course.” Mr. Grant was gone before Gra- 
hom got his views expounded. 

It was a tempting offer this. At any other moment of his 
existence he would have jumped at it ; hut somehow he had 
counted on a whole month’s walking and talking with Bessie 
Barclay. And yet it was foolish. She would be there at the 
month’s end, and home in Ironburgh, where he could see her 
every day ; while, if he missed this opportunity of seeing so 
much he had often wished to see, he would likely regret it 
after. Besides, what excuse could he # offer for not going that 
wouldn’t appear silly ? and when, in the course of the day, he 
walked with Bessie to Blindpits, he explained the matter very 
fully to her. 

“ You know, Bessie,” he said, “ I would rather stay here. 
I thought we would have had a glorious month together.” 

“ I would have liked it very well,” she said ; “ hut you’ll 


BLINDPITS. 


2 25 


see all those grand scenes we have heard so much about. I 
wish I were going.” 

“ I wish you were with all my heart. Some day you and I 
will go over them together ; and now I shall always he seeing 
everything with your eyes.” 

“ It is so kind of Mr. Grant,” she said. 

“ It’s only like him,” said Graham. “ 1 said you would 
like him when you knew him. Have I been a true 
prophet ? ” 

“ Yes, yes ; I like him, hut — ” 

“ But what ? ” 

“ But what does it signify to him ? ” 

“ I don’t exactly see your meaning ; hut I have no doubt 
Mr. Grant would a great deal rather people liked him than 
disliked him. Of course, neither your liking nor mine is of 
vast consequence to him. But yes ; it would vex him if he 
thought I didn’t like him, and it would he very ungrateful if 
I did not.” 

Graham Bichardson was one of the few strangers admitted 
within Miss Boston’s gates and made welcome. His grand- 
mother, long since deceased, had been a friend of Miss Bos- 
ton’s youth, and was in some remote way related to the Bos- 
tons — a fact Graham was not aware of ; and it is to he 
regretted that he had never called on the old lady hut when 
he couldn’t help it. But when Miss Boston saw Bessie and 
him approaching, apparently “as thick as reel-heads,” as she 
said to herself — an image drawn from the art of spinning, in 
which she had been proficient in her young days — she jumped 
to a conclusion, and was inclined to deal kindly by them. 

Next time Mr. Grant called, she began — “Weel, James, I 
tell’t ye how it wad he — ware in the window aye gangs first.” 

“ I’ve heard that ; hut I really don’t understand what you 
refer to, Miss Boston.” 

“ This comes o’ lettin’ my companion away to visits, and 
halls, and sic like.” 

“ What comes ? Has any thing happened ? W T here’s 
Bessie ? ” exclaimed Mr. Grant. 

10 * 


226 


BLINDPITS. 


“ Oil, she’s in the garden puin’ the peas, and she’ll he in in 
a wee to hool them.” 

“Then, what are you speaking about, Miss Boston?” 

“ Dearsake — ye’re dull o’ the uptak. Do ye no ken that 
some young gentlemen are keen to get better acquainted wi’ 
me. Young Mr. Ainslie, I hear frae Davie, is very anxious 
for slips o’ that Ayrshire rose ; and Mr. Richardson thinks the 
view frae here the best in the district. I’m no very sure 
about making my roses cheap ; hut I’ll he glad to see Graham 
when he wants a view.” 

“ It’s not likely he’ll he much here for a while ; and Ainslie 
is to be abroad all winter.” 

“ Weel, I’m glad to hear it, for the lassie’s hut a bairn after 
a’, puir thing.” 

As if to make good the remark, Bessie’s youthful figure 
appeared in the doorway, her face glowing and her apron full 
of peas. She settled herself at the table to her » shelling busi- 
ness ; and after a few words pursued it in silence. 

“Bessie,” said Miss Boston, “ your tongue’s no rinnin’ on 
sae fast as it whiles does.” 

“ Aunt, I’ve nothing to say,” and she blushed ; “ I do wish 
I could convince you that I am not a child.” 

“ That’s no great hardship, Bessie,” said Mr. Grant. 

“ But it is a hardship. You know, aunt, I don’t mind when 
we’re alone. It’s only when you make other people think the 
same thing.” 

“ But Mr. Grant kens ye as weel as I do. He can judge 
for himsel’.” 

“ Child or woman, it’s all the same to me,” said Mr. Grant. 

“ But it’s not the same to me, Mr. Grant ; ” and she swept 
up her peas and went off with them. 

The little flat in Berwick Street had by this time received 
hack under its roof the three elder ladies, much improved — 
those of them that needed improvement — in health and tem- 
per. But the crowning enjoyment of Barbara’s * season was 
yet to come. She had arranged to pay a visit of some weeks’ 
duration to Blindpits. 


BLINDPITS. 


227 


Bessie had written to her continually about it, and when 
she really arrived, she fell upon her neck and said — “ 0 Aunt 
Barbara, you are more to me than all the world yet ; ” and 
Barbara’s heart glowed, and her step was springy on the grass, 
and her sweet face was sweeter and more serene than ever. 
And they visited Grantsburn ; and it was pretty to see them 
stepping about among the mastodons, as Bessie called the 
great clipped evergreens, and strolling out of doors. Barbara 
liked Miss Grant ; her business faculty recommended her — the 
quality that would have relieved the clergyman of every 
trivial care ; and Miss Grant spoke highly of her visitor, but 
without any idea of marrying her to her brother, you may be 
sure. 

“ Bessie,” said Barbara to her niece as they were sauntering 
on the turf in the neighborhood of the house, “ it is foolish 
to allow ourselves to be prejudiced against any one. Mr. Grant 
appears an excellent man. I wonder you don’t like him ! ” 

“ I don’t like him ! How do you think so ? ” and her face 
flushed instantly. 

“ You seem to me to avoid him ; and he always looks after 
you as I would at the movements of a bird I had startled.” 

“ Aunt, you are growing poetical and imaginative. Mr. 
Dods must have infected you since I left.” 

“ I have seen very little of Mr. Dods, and not much of Mrs. 
Dods, I’m ashamed to say.” 

" And what of my music scholars ? ” 

“ I’ve been carrying them on in the evening.” 

“ Aunt ! when you must be so tired.” 

" I don’t feel so easily tired as at the close of winter.” 

“ It seems as if I had been dreaming, and you bring back 
the reality. What a difference between our life and the lives 
of the people here — the ladies, I mean. I daresay none of 
them ever knew what it is to be tired with hard work, but I 
don’t envy them, I really don’t, aunt. Better be tired with 
hard work than with idleness or useless make-believe work. 
Only, as Miss Boston says, one-half of the world doesn’t know 
Jiow the other lives. How is Miss Dobbie ? ” 


228 


BLINDPITS. 


u She is as well as possible.” 

11 And Mr. Pettigrew and Mr. Richardson ? Does he pop 
in to play backgammon with grandmamma ever? ” 

“ Sometimes he does.” 

“ And there’s no word of Mr. Dods’ poems ? and he still 
polishes the candlesticks ? ” 

“ I suppose so. As for the trash he calls poetry, I have 
heard nothing of it.” 

“ 0 aunt, don’t call it trash ; it is really very good sense, 
and not bad rhyme.” 

“ It is of small consequence what it is. To come back to 
Mr. Grant ; if he is all he appears to be ” — 

“ All he appears to be ! Aunt, I couldn’t have believed it 
of you. He is all he appears to be, and a great deal more. 
If you heard Graham speak of him, or any one. He is 
extremely popular ; and did you ever hear of a popular factor ? 
— I mean I never read of one. And he is equally a favorite 
with the Marquis. He manages everything here ; and there 
is an estate in England which is also managed under his 
occasional superintendence. He has so much business, and 
must be often worried and anxious, yet I have never seen his 
temper ruffled. His great enjoyment is riding. Lots of visit- 
ors come here, but I sometimes fancy he is lonely. He doesn’t 
seem to have any very intimate friend ; and I’m sure he does 
not court Miss Boston for her money ” — 

“ Don’t run yourself out of breath, my dear. You seem to 
have made Mr. Grant a study. I must try to imbibe some of 
your enthusiasm.” 

“ I’m not enthusiastic, I’m only just ; and it doesn’t take 
much study to see what passes before one’s eyes.” 

“ I hope you won’t be spoilt here. How will you like to 
come back to your duties at home ? ” 

“ None the worse for being here, I am sure of that ; and 
I’ve kept up my music. Miss Boston is a queer mixture of 
fine feeling, with a dash of coarseness. She told me I was not 
to forget the way to get my living in her house, — very plain, 
— and what I couldn’t have said if she had been in my place 


BLINDPITS. 


229 


and I in hers ; so you see it’s as well we never counted on her 
money. I once got a small hard stone in bread I was eating ; 
the bread was very good, hut every tooth jarred on the stone. 
She always reminds me of that.” 

“All of us have something we would he better without, 
Bessie.” 

“ I’m sure of it, auntie ; only I could not hit on what you 
would he better without.” 

Bessie was very dear to her aunt, and no wonder. 

When Miss Barclay went hack to Ironburgh, she was per- 
suaded to leave her niece behind, and Bessie saw her go with 
a pang of regret, no doubt ; hut she was well pleased to stay, 
especially as her aunt pointed out to her that it was her 
present duty to lay in a store of robust health. 

“ And Bessie,” she said, “ Miss Boston may be the better 
for you too ; he attentive to her, as much so as you would he 
to grandmamma or Miss Dobbie ; and you’ll have your reward 
all the higher that it is not in money. I think it an advan- 
tage for you to live for a time among people who have money, 
as you will see for yourself what it can accomplish, and what 
it cannot ; ” and Barbara went hack under the smoky canopy 
of Ironburgh, to labor for her household. 

Mr. Grant had not dropped his visits to Blindpits while 
Miss Barclay was there. On the contrary, he had increased 
them, and always paid almost marked deference to her; so 
much so, that Miss Boston augured the best for apian that had 
occurred to her before ; hut she prudently abstained from all 
allusion to her hopes, for if anything so cold as an iceberg will 
fly asunder, in a thousand pieces, at the vibration of a human 
voice, how much more an incipient love affair ? 

After Barbara’s departure a period of six weeks elapsed and 
Mr. Grant never once appeared at Blindpits. Dr. Grant 
seemed to he his substitute. 

“What’s come o’ your father a’ this time, John?” Miss 
Boston would say. 

“ I fancy he’s very busy ; hut he always hears of you through 
me, you know.” 


230 


BLINDPITS. 


u His thrang maun be something by ordinar ; I dinna think 
he’s been as lang out o’ this house for years.” 

How, Hr. Grant perfectly knew his father’s reason. Ho 
doubt he had become aware of the public rumors as to his cu- 
pidity in hoping to seize the whole inheritance, and he kept 
away from Blindpits to regain his standing in the public eye . 
but John as little questioned that Miss Boston’s will was sat- 
isfactorily written, signed, and sealed. There were few dead 
walls that the doctor could not see through. 


CHAPTER XXIX. 


As the season waned, like other people, the sun thought it 
no use rising so early ; hut, as the curtains of Louis the Four- 
teenths bed were never drawn, till, with his own hands he 
had placed his wig upon his own royal head, so the King of 
the Day doffed none of his state at his late toilette, and, as he 
girt himself to the business of the day, he left his gorgeous 
morning mantle floating on the east, and flushing the west 
with borrowed splendor. If the mantle lingered and disap- 
peared gradually, country people said it would be a fine day ; 
but if it faded suddenly, then you might look out for squalls. 

Miss Boston’s staff of domestics did not view nature with 
the eye of a poet. Getting out of bed when you were not 
obliged to do so, and merely to see the sun rise, was not to be 
accounted for by ordinary rules. 

When Bessie Barclay once rushed to the door the better to 
see a rainbow, Bell drily asked, “ if there were no rainbows 
in Ironburgh.” And when she had stood more than an hour, 
watching the evolutions of Miss Boston’s beautiful snowy 
ducks on the pond, the same individual sarcastically remarked, 
“she wad ken what to do when she turned a duke.” The 
presumption is, that the idea was original to Bell, and not bor- 
rowed from Pythagoras. 

But Bessie stuck in a praiseworthy manner to her habit of 
early rising. She would get up and dress by instinct, or by 
moonlight, and turn out to see the moon fade into a pale ghost 
before the coming day. A November morning may have 
almost summer warmth, combined with the hush of winter. 


232 


BLINDPITS. 


The soft neutral-tinted sky, the grey and lead colors of which 
bring out the deep rose of the clouds in the east, where the 
sun stands up like the gold shield of Montezuma, suit well 
with the resting earth. The grass by the road-sides is green, 
for there has been little frost yet ; and the fir-trees, the stoics 
of the wood, stand erect; and beech hedges, with brown 
leaves that will cling on through rain and storm, as if for the 
dear life, till a young generation pushing forth will thrust 
them from their places ; and hawthorns, not quite rifled of 
clieir haws — these were the near features of Bessie’s walk 
towards the sea. 

The sea looked sullen below the dull skies, but it had its 
charm — it always had for her. She had no terrible associa- 
tions with it, and all the summer it had crept into the study 
of her imagination. She had been told — by whom we don’t 
need to guess; — that the sea in proportion to the earth is as if 
you dipped a brush in a little water, and drew it gently over 
the surface of an orange ; but at first sight, and now when 
she was gazing on it, it seemed one of the most magnificent 
of God’s creatures. This morning she stepped to a rock which 
was often her gazing-place, it was higher than the rocks near 
it, and there were nooks of shelter in it, where she could sit 
and look out hidden from the wind. She sat down, for she 
had a quarter of an hour to spare, and watched the tide 
coming in. She sat and lost herself thinking — thinking over 
all the problems that beset young thinkers, and which the 
experience of one person, or one generation, never works out 
for the next, for there they always are, as fresh and as myste- 
rious as that mighty sea with its never-failing tides. She sat 
there looking back on the time when she was young, for she 
was old now. As long as a romantic young person is young, 
there is nothing he or she delights in more than this fiction, 
being old and living in the past ; and although the romantic 
element in her had been pretty well stifled in its outward 
development, she had no difficulty in indulging in the luxury 
of old age, and her past was a very innocent one, a pretty 
shady lane in which to take a walk. B /e and bye, with everj 


BLINDPITS. 


233 


soul not left to itself, tlie effort is to leave problems and the 
past — an erring past it may be — behind, and to live in the 
pure atmosphere of child-like faith. 

She woke up at last to the bald fact that it was near the 
breakfast-hour, took a lingering loving look seaward, and 
turned to go up the beach. She gave a great start of horror, 
for between her and the dry land a watery gulf had crept 
round and round, beyond her frail ability to pass. Yet it 
seemed incredible ; she had been there dozens of times for 
hours, and now — oh, the despairing sickness that came over 
her ! It was a solitary place, and at that season and that hour 
of the morning, there was small chance of any one passing — 
even of any one looking — in the direction ; and from a dis- 
tance she might be taken for anything but a human being — 
for a bird possibly ; a heron stood on a rock not far off, and 
the calm impassiveness of the creature was torture to her. 
She thought of the female martyrs of the Solway, and if she 
had been a martyr to some great cause it seemed as if she 
could have borne it ; but to be drowned simply through her 
own carelessness was horrible indeed. And not merely for 
herself but for others. Aunt Barbara at that moment would 
be walking quietly along the street of Ironburgh to her daily 
work ; if she could know that she was alone here drowning ! 
And when she did know, what a life-long agony of grief she 
would suffer. But she did not lose hope altogether. She 
moved from place to place on her prison ; she stretched herself 
up, and waved her handkerchief above her head ; she cried 
too as loud as she could, and the waves carried her voice to 
land, but there was no ear to catch it — no ear but that of the 
heron, which, roused, spread its wings as if in mockery, flew 
to the shore and perched there in safety. It occurred to her 
that the very top of the rock did not look as if the tide had 
been over it recently — perhaps it was not always covered ; 
but that hope died out on closer examination. And the shore 
was so near ; and even now the gulf was narrow yet impassi- 
ble. 

After an age of suspense — that is, only a quarter of an 


234 


BLINDPITS. 


hour really — she saw a man on horseback riding rapidly along 
the shore road — would he notice her ? oh ! would he notice 
her? She waved her handkerchief wildly — he was passing! 
He was nearly past wdien he suddenly drew up and looked — 
looked for an instant, then turned down to the beach. Bessie 
hastily calmed herself as she saw help coming, and she stood 
as still as the heron, with a face the color of the moon that 
you could yet see in the heavens. When she recognized Mr. 
Grant on Meg her face glowed and paled again. When Mr. 
Grant saw who the prisoner was, his complexion seemed to 
borrow the gray hue of the sea, and he did not speak. He 
steered Meg to the side of the rock, and held her there with 
one hand ; the other he stretched to Bessie, and said, “ Can 
you reach me ? I don’t think your aunt would object just now. 
Spring down lightly here ; if you drop into the sea I’ll fish 
you out.” 

She managed to get hold of his hand, and alighted before 
him like a feather. He held her fast ; Meg turned, and was 
on dry land almost immediately. 

“ You must be wet, Mr. Grant. I am very sorry ” 

“ You had need.” 

“ I don’t know how it happened ” 

“See that it does not happen again. Keep on shore till 
you can swim as well as Meg.” 

“ I don’t know how to thank you, I’m sure.” 

“ Don’t perplex yourself ; I did not know it was you I was 
going to rescue.” 

“I know that — I know that quite well. I think if you 
would allow me to get down here, I would not trouble you 
farther ! ” As he looked on the white face so near him, a 
blush, like the hue of a sea-shell, stole-over it. 

" I really don’t mind taking a little more trouble,” he said ; 
“ but I daresay you are right. You’ll run less risk of cold, 
walking. See, I’ll set you down on this green hillock, the 
haunt of the fairies. There you are ! now trot away home as 
fast you can and get off that draggled gown,” and he touched 
his hat and rode away. She sat down and burst into tears, 


BLINDPITS. 


235 


and was still sitting on the same place on the knoll, when Mr. 
Grant, looking round, saw her and rode hack. “ Bessie,” he 
said, “ why don’t you walk on ? It will never do to sit there. 
Poor child ! you’ve been sadly frightened.” 

“ I’m not a child, Mr. Grant,” and her dark eyes glowed 
“ I’ve been face to face with death, and that might shake even 
a strong man ; hut I shall find my way now. Thank you ; 
good morning ; ” and she crossed the road and disappeared 
among the trees. 

Mr. Grant, wet as he was, rode slowly and meditated — • 
“ Why should I not ? Why should I not ? She is less than 
half my age, is that a good reason to hinder me ? Certainly 
not. But her ? — that’s a different thing. If I had let Gra- 
ham stay and have his chance ; but I could not — I could not 
do that ; and now, when I have kept out of her way so long 
to let him have it, yet, out of my sight, she waves me to her 
from the middle of the sea, and springs into my arms. Why 
should I not try to win her ? ” and suddenly Meg was put to 
the gallop as a figurative answer to her master’s question. 

Bessie entered Miss Boston’s presence with the feeling of a 
culprit. She felt that she had done a feckless thing worthy 
of the Misses Stark, in sitting till the tide crept round and 
hemmed her in ; and somehow she did not expect Miss Boston 
to have much mercy. 

“ Bairn, what’s keepit ye ? Where ha’e ye been ? Ha’e 
ye gotten ony breakfast ? ” was the greeting that met her. 

“ I wasn’t in a very hospitable place, aunt. I sat on a rock 
till I couldn’t get off it.” 

“ Bairn, ye’re jokin’.” 

“No, see ! — I am next thing to a mermaid;” and she ex- 
hibited her wet skirts. 

“ Put on dry claes this minute, and ye can tell me aboot it 
after.” 

And over breakfast Bessie told her story. “ Now,” she said, 
“ wasn’t it desperately stupid ? ” 

“ Weel, I dinna ken ; young folk hae a heap o’ pleasant 
thoughts to beguile time.” 


236 


BLINDPITS. 


11 1 thought you would either scold me or laugh at me for 
stupidity.” 

“ Bairn, I’m ower glad to see ye safe. What possessed 
J ames Grant that he left ye to trail hame yer lane ? He 
might hae gien ye a gallop here. But a strong man like him 
doesna think o’ folk getting cauld. Bairn, it mak’s me sick 
to think o’ the risk ye ran.” 

Bessie cried again. In her excited state she had cried for 
Mr. Grant’s want of sympathy, and now she cried for Miss 
Boston’s unexpected sympathy. 

“ I hope it’ll he a lesson to ye, Bessie ; and now dinna greet 
ony mair ahoot it. When did J ames Grant say he was coming 
up?” 

“ He didn’t say.” 

“ Did ye no ask him ? ” 

“ Ho.” 

“ I canna think what his thrang can he ; he hasna missed a 
week coming to see me, when he was at hame, for twenty 
years, I think, till now.” 

“ If I were you I would send for him to explain it, since it 
is so mysterious as that.” And she pondered the mystery; 
hut that Mr. Grant’s movements could in any way he influen- 
ced by herself, did not occur to her any more than that she 
could influence the tides. 


CHAPTER XXX. 


The mild genial morning had grown into a dull wet after- 
noon ; Miss Boston had fallen asleep, not in her easy chair, 
for an easy chair she seldom sat in, and Bessie stood at the 
window looking at the soaking persistent rain, when she saw 
Mr. Grant enter the gate. Her impulse was to slip away and 
settle herself hy the fireside in her own room, and as she did 
so she said, “ They’ll have plenty to speak of, and will he as 
well without me.” 

Miss Boston was aroused hy Bell ushering in the visitor. 
u Preserve me, James,” she said, “ is this you ? a sight o’ you 
is gude for sair een ; what apology hae ye to mak ? ” 

“ Apology for what, ma’am ? ” 

“ Ye’ll maybe no ken that it’s mair than six weeks since ye 
w T as here ? ” 

“ Is it indeed ? hut I was hearing of you nearly every day, 
and you are not at all dependent on me now.” 

“ Because I have Bessie ? I daursay if I hadna had her I 
wad hae missed ye mair, I’se warrant, and I doubtna she has 
missed ye as weel as me ; hut gie an account o’ yersel’ ; 
what’s a’ the thrang been ? ” 

“ I haven’t been very busy, hut where is she ? What have 
you made of this companion of yours ? ” 

“ She was here twa-three minutes since, maybe she is writ- 
ing to her aunt in her ain room ; she had a letter frae her yes- 
terday.” 

“ And she’s well, I hope ? ” Mr. Grant was standing on 
the hearth, and put his question in a tone that made Miss 


238 


BLINDPITS. 


Boston misgive as to the success of her scheme ; it was a tone 
void of vivid interest, either open or concealed. 

“ Yes, Barbara’s weel ; she’s ane o’ the best o’ God’s crea 
tures, James.” 

“ I believe it,” he said; “ a really excellent woman.” 

“ Ay, there’s few like her now-a-days ; women can do 
naething now but speak, and no mony o’ them can even do 
that to muckle purpose ; but Barbara can baith make and 
mend, and manage, and speak mair sense in an hour than 
maist o’ them will do in a week.” 

“ An admirable person, I’m sure of it,” he rejoined. 

“ I whiles think men are stane blind, that the like o’ Bar- 
bara is a single woman.” 

“ Her own blame, if there is blame in it ; ladies are not 
compelled to marry in these days.” 

“ G-ae ’way ; what’s a man worth that canna carry his point 
if there’s nae by ordinar obstacle ; but I declare the ver} 7 " men 
are growing lazy, and they’ll neither tak trouble nor risk, for- 
sooth, unless they’re met a gey bit mair than half-way ; I won- 
der what the world’s cornin’ to.” 

“ It’s thought to be making great progress, Miss Boston.” 

“Weel, it may be; but lang syne folk married young, on 
sma’ means, and made them do, and lived a lang life thegither, 
they stayed at hame wi’ half-a-dozen books and their wark 
and got haud o’ life ; and when it came to the partin’, they 
kenned ither weel aneuch to be sure they wadna miss when 
they met again. But now folk hae nae time for onything, and 
bairns in their teens hae mair sense o’ the need o’ siller in this 
warld than their grandfaithers had when they left it ; and the 
women, instead o’ minding their wark as their grandmothers 
did, do naething ; the very working-men’s wives buy their 
bairns’ pinnies ready-made — bits o’ rags bewildered wi’ 
colored braid that throws at the first washin.’ Gude pity the 
man that has a wife to seek the now ! ” 

“Well Miss Boston, I’m not going to defend the faults of 
our time. But I think you’ll allow that human nature is 
much the same in all ages ” 


BLINDPITS. 


239 


“ Ay, but there’s whiles times o’ ignorance and wickedness 
that are winked at, and maybe there’s a wdnk at this present 
time.” 

“We may be wicked, but we don’t think we are ignorant; 
and surely knowledge is greatly diffused ! ” 

“ May be ; but there’s no the industry and thrift there used 
to be.’ 

“ I beg pardon ; there never was a time when more people 
worked harder than at the present day. No doubt they spend 
more money than they used to do, but whether that’s a want 
of thrift depends on how it is spent.” Mr. Grant could have 
said a great deal more on this subject, and more to the point, 
but his thoughts were preoccupied. Moreover, he had gone 
over the same ground with Miss Boston pretty frequently — for 
the minds of even strong-minded people, who live much alone, 
are apt to become something of circulating repetends. 

“ Weel, we’ll hope it’s my auld-fashioned notions, that, like 
ruysel’, hae outlived their time, and no what’s ca’ed modern 
progress that’s amiss. Are ye gaun to bide to yer tea, 
James?” Mr. Grant made no objection. 

11 Does your companion often forsake you for a whole after- 
noon ? ” he asked. 

“ Bessie ? No, no ; puir thing, she’s aye here. I watna 
what she’s about a’ this time.” 

“ You’ll not think her so perfect as her aunt, probably ? ” 

“ She’s different — clean different — and she’s but young ; but 
I’ll no say but what she’s mair entertaining wi’ her tongue 
than* Barbara, if she hasna sae muckle gude sense. It wad 
hae been lang or Barbara had satten down hand-idle till the 
tide was a’ round her ; but she has plenty time to gather sense 
yet.” 

“ Why, she’s not so very young. If she has as little sense 
as you say ” 

“ I didna say she had little sense. She has mair o’ the 
kind o’t than maist folk o’ her years.” 

“ I beg pardon ; and what kind of sense is it she has ? ” 

Mr. Grant could have wished to keep his old friend on this 


240 


BLINDPITS. 


subject long enough, and she was totally unconscious of being 
led on. 

“ It’s a queer mixture. I’ll no say I could describe it ; but 
hae ye nae notion yersel’ ? Did her tongue lie a’ the time she 
was at Grantsburn? There’s ae thing, it’s no the kind o’ 
sense that’s uppermost among the present generation. She 
hasna what they ca’ an eye to the main chance.” 

“ But that’s necessary in this world, Miss Boston.” 

“ Is it, Mr. Grant ? Ye’ll hae been hearing the reader to 
the ignorant men, hae ye ? Jean Stark brought me the book 
they’ve been reading, a’ about self-made, successful men, as 
they’re ca’ed. I says, 1 Jean, gang and read me the first 
twelve verses o’ the fifth chapter o’ Matthew’s Gospel. Now,’ 
I said, ‘ how mony blessings are promised to the successful 
man ? ’ Jean could say naething ; no but what something 
could be said ; only, Jemes, I hae kenned sae mony unsuccess- 
ful men in my day — noble men, some o’ them — that the con- 
stant deification o’ success rouses me.” 

“That’s true. But, after all, what safer standard can a 
man judge his fellow by than that of success ? ” 

‘[A y, a man his fellow-man! That’s the element, James, 
that makes the want of success the discipline it is, and was 
intended to be. Losing his cause among his fellow-men, the 
poor man carries his case to a higher court. There’s Barbara 
Barclay, a single woman, working for her daily bread. I 
fancy maist folk she comes across will look down on her. 
She’s ane o’ my instances o’ success. I ay feel sma’ aside 
Barbara.” 

Not to be cynical, it was a much easier thing, and more 
meritorious, for Miss Boston to feel small beside Barbara than 
to feel small beside, for instance, the Ainslies of Edenside. 
Mr. Grant had a perception of this, and he smiled, but only 
said — 

“ No doubt, Miss Barclay is a pattern woman. I suppose 
she has trained her niece to be such another ? ” 

“ That she hasna done, although I’se warrant she’s tried it.” 
At this moment Bell came in with the tea, and Bessie entered 
behind her. 


BLINDPITS. 


241 


“ Lassie, hae ye "been dreaming again ? It’s as weel ye 
wasna on a stane in the middle o’ the sea this time.” 

“ Aunt,” said she, blushing, “ I don’t often do such stupid 
things as that — now, do I ? ” 

In shaking hands with Mr. Grant, she said, “1 didn’t 
thank you very rationally in the morning, but I can’t tell you 
how thankful I was.” 

“So was I, I assure you. You have got quite over it, I 
hope ? ” 

“ Have you been busy a’ the afternoon writing an account 
o’t to your aunt ? ” said Miss Boston. 

“ Ho, I haven’t been writing ; but if I had, I wouldn’t have 
said anything about it. There’s no harm in not mentioning 
it, is there ? ” 

“ Ho, I think ye’re wise. Yer aunt wad send for ye imme- 
diately if she kent. How gie us our tea, bairn. It’s a lang 
time, James, since ye was here at tea.” 

“ I mean to make up for it now. Maybe I’ll come so often 
that you’ll tire of me.” 

“We’ll let you ken when that happens; but I daursay 
Bessie there thinks ye a godsend this dreary night.” 

“ I, Miss Boston ? not I,” said Bessie, quickly ; “ that is, 
I’m very glad to see Mr. Grant, of course, but ” 

“But the lassie’s in a creel, I think,” said Miss Boston. 
“Ye needna be sae plain, tellin’ Mr. Grant ye dinna prize his 
company when he saved yer life just this morning. Gie me a 
bit mair sugar, if you please.” 

Mr. Grant had drawn his chair into the shade, and was 
watching Bessie’s flushed face. He said, “Ingratitude is a 
very common sin, Miss Boston, and virtue must learn to be its 
own reward.” 

“ I’m very grateful, and you know that. I’m not going to 
say anything more about it. Do you want any more tea, Mr 
Grant ? ” 

When the meal was over Miss Boston said, “Bessie, ye had 
better take Mr. Grant up stairs, and gie him some music.” 

11 


242 


BLINDPITS. 


11 The fire is out, aunt. I looked in as I came down, and it 
was quite black.” 

“ Bell will kindle the fire in a minute, the room canna he 
cauld yet.” 

“ But Mr. Grant has heard my music often, and he does not 
care about it, I daresay.” 

“ Yes, I do care, if it is not positively disagreeable to you.” 

u Gie ’way — disagreeable ! She’s bummin’ on at the hale 
day. What’s come ower ye, Bessie ? Ye had better gie Mr. 
Grant a reading o’ yer aunt’s letter, too, when ye’re up the 
stairs. No that there’s onything in’t,” she thought, as they 
left the room ; “ but Barbara has a capital hand o’ WTit, and 
it’s sensible and wiselike — out and out, like hersel’.” 

“ Yes, Mr. Grant,” you’ll like to read aunt’s letter. I read 
it several times this morning on the rock — here it is.” 

“ It must be of an absorbing nature,” thought Mr. Grant, 
as he began it. There was good paper, better penmanship, 
and the best grammar. There were little family details, 
advice to Bessie, a good many “ I hopes ” and 11 1 trusts.” 

“ It is an excellent letter,” he said, as he returned it to the 
envelope. u How beautifully your aunt writes.” 

u Yes, it’s very capital writing, I think ; I’ve tried to copy 
it as closely as I could.” 

“ I never saw your writing, is it like that ? ” 

Like, but not nearly so good. What shall I play then ? ” 

He picked out some music, then seated himself conveniently 
by the fire, and resigned himself to the double bliss of looking 
and listening. 

She played on and on. At last she said, “ Do you think it 
very polite leaving Miss Boston so long alone ? ” 

“ You should know best,” he said, coming and standing 
behind her. “ Did you think it polite to leave her all the 
afternoon ? ” 

u I knew you were with her.” 

“ That need not have prevented your coming down.” 

“ No, it need not.” 

u Then, w r hy did you not come down ? ” 


BLINDPITS. 


243 


She did not answer. 

“ Was it because I was in ? ” 

“Yes” 

“Why do you avoid me ? I’m going to find out the reason. 
Do you dislike me, Bessie ? Bessie,” he repeated softly, “ do 
you dislike me ? ” 

“Ho.” She had leant forward on the piano with her head 
resting on her hands. 

“ Then why did you not come down ? You would have 
done that if Miss Stark had come in.” 

She did not speak. He stooped till his head was on a level 
with hers, and he whispered in her ear, “ Tell me, Bessie, do 
you love me ? ” 

Still she did not speak. He repeated the question, putting 
his hand on her shoulder. She made an impatient movement, 
and looking up, suddenly said, “ Ho, I do not.” 

His face took the same ashy hue that overspread it in the 
morning, and he went and sat down by the fire again. Bessie 
did not feel herself quite the mistress of the situation she did 
in Mr. Ainslie’s case. She turned over her music rapidly, not 
knowing either what she was looking for or at ; hut she clutched 
her dignity to her, and did her best to suppress any appear- 
ance of feeling. The long pause seemed awkward, and she 
said, “ Do you wish any more music, Mr. Grant ? ” 

“ Ho, certainly not — not to-night.” 

“ Then I’ll go down to Miss Boston.” 

Suddenly he remembered Miss Boston’s question, “ What is 
a man worth that cannot carry his point if there is no ex- 
traordinary obstacle ? ” Was there such an obstacle ? 

She was at the door when he rose and stopped her. “ Stay 
here a little longer, if you please,” he said. “Sit down 
here ; ” and he put her on the sofa, and drew his chair near 
her. “ How,” he said, “ if you neither like nor dislike me 
particularly, why is it you are so different from what you used 
to be at Grantsburn ? I can’t understand it. Can you tell 
me ? — or, rather, will you tell me ? ” 

“ I could tell you ; but I haven’t made up my mind that I 
will tell you.” 


244 


BLINDPITS. 


" Will you take long to make up your mind ? Put the case 
before me, and Pll give you my advice.” 

Worked up as she was, she laughed, and was glad she 
laughed instead of crying. 

“ I think,” she said, rising, “ I’ll take the case to avizandum. 
I can’t tell you now.” 

“ I wish I had thought of asking you before I took you off 
the rock this morning ; you would have been more reasonable 
then.” 

“I am not unreasonable, surely. I owe you much, it is 
true — why should I not tell you ? I’m not ashamed of the 
reason — I felt if I allowed myself I would love you — that’s 
all ; now I’ll go.” 

“ You’ll not go. Do you think I am going to let you go 
now ? Why not allow yourself ? Either you must be duller,, 
or I must be a better actor than I think, if you have not 
guessed my feelings towards you.” 

“Yes,” she said simply, “I thought you liked me in a 
way.” 

“ In a way ! ” he broke in, impatiently. 

“ But,” she went on, looking dignified, “ I have long 
resolved not to marry any one who would not treat me as an 
equal.” 

u Bessie, I did not think you were such a little goose.” 

“ There now. I knew you would presume on your advan- 
tage in being older than me ” 

“ Advantage ! If it’s an advantage, it’s turned wrong side 
out.” 

“ Circumstance then — to think I should be your echo ! 
Now, I shall never sink my own individuality in that of any 
person whatever.” 

“ I hope not. Your individuality is your charm.” 

“ I might obey if I thought the command reasonable ; but 
I should object very decidedly to being treated as a child or a 
squaw.” 

“ A child or a squaw ! ” repeated Mr. Grant. 

“ Yes ; there are many squaws in this country ; but it 
would not be possible to make one out of me.” 


BLINDP1TS. 


245 


“ What do you take me for, Bessie ? Do as you like — rule 
me and everything that is mine.” 

“ If I could believe that ” 

“You are an unaccountable being. But you are right ; you 

don’t love me. Love does not calculate ” 

“ Does it not ? ” she said, with a shy happy laugh ; “ but it 
often speaks nonsense, dosen’t it ? ” 

“ Little witch ! ” he said, as his arms closed round her, 
“ you’ve been laughing all the time. You love me, Bessie.” 

“ More than any one on earth.” Alas for poor Aunt Bar- 
bara ! 


CHAPTER XXXI. 


They could not stay in that fossil chamber for ever ; nay, 
they had to leave it, and face the bare facts of life. Miss 
Boston asked Mr. Grant to stay and eat an egg with them, 
which he was very ready to do. The egg was a literal, not a 
figurative, description of the entertainment; but it was 
chipped in silent bliss, Miss Boston doing the most of the 
speaking. 

“ What a night o’ wind and rain it is ! Could ye no bide a’ 
night, James ? Yer sister wadna be anxious.” 

“ I doubt she would. I can hardly do that, although it’s a 
great temptation.” 

“I hope Davie hasna forgotten your horse and gane away 
to his bed.” 

11 Oh, it does not matter ; I can get it out myself.” 

“ And how’s Bessie keeping up her music ? Ye’ve had as 
muckle the night as will ser’ ye for a while, I think.” 

“Hot at all. I mean to come over frequently, and hear 
how she gets on.” 

“ Weel, ye canna come ower often.” 

“ I don’t think I can, Miss Boston.” 

“ And Bessie will aye be glad to play to ye, I’m sure. I 
hope her aunt’ll no send for her in a hurry.” 

The mention of her aunt gave Bessie a pang — her first step 
down from the mount of transfiguration. 

Bell brought Mr. Grant’s plaid, which she had dried care- 
fully at the kitchen-fire, with a lively sense of reward, which 
was not baulked, and then he said — 


BLINDPITS. 


247 


u That will do, Bell,” and she retired to her dominions. 
ITe prevented Miss Boston coming into the lobby to catch 
cold, and shut the parlor-door. “And now, good night, 
Bessie,” he said. “ You are dear to me — dearer than you can 
understand. I thought the power of loving as I do had died 
out of me ; hut it has come to life and vigor under your 
touch.” 

Something of melancholy had crept into his tones, and de- 
tecting it, she said, “ But Mr. Grant, I’ll not he a squaw — Fm 
quite in earnest, remember.” 

“We’ll see. Don’t perch yourself on a rock to-morrow; 
that’s the only command I’ll issue just now. I hope you think 
it reasonable ; ” and bidding her good night again, after the 
fashion of lovers, he passed out into the rain and darkness. 
Davie was holding his horse all ready ; and when he found a 
penny put into his hand he was tumbled from an eminence of 
hope, but picked himself up quickly, considering that possibly 
Mr. Grant had no other coin, and that certainly he was not in 
his debt ; but when he threw the light of the stable-lantern 
on his palm, and saw a half-crown lying there, then indeed his 
heart sang for joy. 

Although his son and daughter-in-law had a habit of speak- 
ing of Mr. Grant as if he were a patriarch, there was really 
no sign of age about him, except that he kept a diary of the 
weather. Very young men don’t generally do that — somehow 
it doesn’t occur to them. But he had not much consciousness 
of the weather as he rode home that night. It seemed as if 
his life were beginning again with added power and volume. 
His boyish love for his son’s mother was a poor thing com- 
pared with this love. That had perished even before the 
object of it ; and when he laid the earth on her, his grief had 
been more for her than himself. But this — the pent-up yearn- 
ings of 3'ears flowed into it. The want had not been a sudden 
one, but he had found the supply of it all at once where he had 
least looked for it. Was it selfish, he asked himself, to seize 
it ? The glamour of life was over for him — but for her ? He 
had seized it, however, and a tremulous happiness stole over 


248 


BLINDPITS. 


him — not what you would have expected in a man who 
laughed heartily and spoke loudly often, and was over head and 
ears in agricultural affairs, and popular in his county. When 
he went in his sister had gone to bed, and he looked at the vari- 
ous corners of the room Bessie had occupied. He could almost 
fancy her there. Soon she would he there, not to go away ever 
again. 

“ What was Mr. Grant saying to ye at the door, Bessie ? ” 
asked Miss Boston. 

u He was saying good night.” 

“ He took a long time to say it. I was feared he was per- 
suading you to visit Grantsburn again. I think he has a 
notion in his head. Ye’ll maybe hae him for a nearer friend 
some day, Bessie. 

te Yes,” she said ; hut although she had heard the sound of 
Miss Boston’s voice, she had not heard a word of what she 
said — she was wrapped in a trance. But Miss Boston 
gathered confirmation of her own views from Bessie’s hap- 
hazard answer. She had confidence in her observing faculty, 
more especially when it was hacked by her own, and she went 
on — “ He’ll be a gude friend to ye ; and I think your aunt is 
a very fortunate woman, and he’s a fortunate man. It is a 
discreet thing, look at it which way you like. I canna say I 
approve o’ very early marriages.” 

“ Ho,” was the rejoinder this time. Bessie was still stand- 
ing looking down, and drawing her finger back and forward 
on the tablecloth ; but in the spirit she was away in her aerial 
castle. What fabric was ever like it ? And it was love, pure 
and simple; there was no base alloy. It' did not enter into 
this young girl’s mind to consider whether she was making a 
good match or not, if Grantsburn was a desirable residence, nor 
(as I have heard canvassed in like circumstances) what her means 
would be in case of widowhood. Mr. Grant loved her, and she 
loved him, and on these two pillars “ love built a stately house.” 
nevertheless, in love as in death, the spirit is subject (for its 
good) to be rubbed the wrong way of the fur by all the little 
claims of life. Bessie issued from the gates of her castle 


BLINDPITS. 


249 


summoned by Bell jerking the tablecloth from Deneath her 
hand. Miss Boston was pursuing her theme. 

‘f Miss Grant,” she was saying, “ will likely gang to live 
with Mrs. Bichardson. I have often heard them say they wad 
like to be thegether.” 

“ Surely, Miss Boston,” said Bessie, “ it is time enough to 
consider that.” 

In the depths of her consciousness it did not occur to her 
that Miss Boston could know nothing of her secret. 

“Ay, as ye say, it’s time enough. There’s mony a slip 
atween the cup and the lip.” 

“ But why should Miss Grant not stay where she is ? ” 

“ Your aunt might no like it.” 

“ Aunt would never think of objecting ; of that I am 
sure.” 

“Weel, weel, lassie, they’ll do as they like; but gey and 
often friends gree best separate ; it’s a puir compliment to 
human nature, but it’s true for a’ that.” 

Next day Bessie sat in the window and watched the road. 
Would he come ? He had not said he would come, nor when 
he would come, but surely he must come. 

“ Bairn,” said Miss Boston, “ ye’ll be cauld sitting there ; 
come to the fireside.” 

u No, thank you ; I’m not cold.” 

“ But what are ye seein’ ? Is there onything to be seen 
but the craws waddling amang the ploughed land ? ” 

“ They’re worth looking at. How wise and important they 
seem.” 

“ Ay, I’ve often diverted mysel’ watching them ; they’re 
like a heap o’ folk, they would pass if they could haud their 
tongues, but they will cry caw, caw.” 

At length Bessie caught sight of something more interest- 
ing than the crows, of whose approach she gave no intimation ; 
but she rose and left the room, and met Mr. Grant at the 
door. 

" You’re not going to run away to-day again, are you ? ” 
he said. 

11 * 


250 


BLINDPITS. 


“ No, I’ll be back in a little. Please tell Miss Boston, will 
you ? ” 

“ Tell her what ? ” 

“ You know what I mean.” 

“ I’m not sure that I do. Come, say what I’m to tell her.” 

“ That you — that I — You know quite well.” 

“ But I may not put it in proper words.” 

“ Oh, you needn’t be particular.” 

“ But I would like to do it properly. Shall I say you and 
I think of entering the matrimonial state under what we 
fondly think happy auspices; or shall I just say, ‘Miss 
Boston, Bessie and I are sweethearts ? ’ ” 

“You are wicked — either form will do.” 

“Now, don’t be long of coming back. I’ll make short 
work of my news.” 

“ You’re gaun to mak’ up to us now, James, for lost time,” 
said Miss Boston, as he went in. 

“ I said that last night, didn’t I ? I’m going to be married, 
Miss Boston.” 

“ Ye’ll be thinking ye’ll surprise me ; but I’ve been expect- 
ing to hear that, although I’m no just sae gleg as I have been. 
Weel, I think it’s the best thing ye can do.” 

“ You don’t ask who the lady is.” 

“I can guess — I have een in my head — and I see now 
what the thrang’s been. IIow often hae ye been at Ironburgh 
the last six weeks, J ames ? ” 

“ Not once. Why do you ask ? ” 

“ It is — is it no Barbara Barclay you’re gaun to marry ? ” 

“ Certainly not. It’s her niece.” 

“ Bessie ! Preserve me, James, she’s just a bairn.” 

“ Too true ; but I can’t help that.” 

“ Babara wad be far liker ye.” 

“ In point of age ; but the idea never occurred to me, and 
could not occur ; reason and feeling don’t always go to- 
gether.” 

“ A weel I wat no, J ames — I ken that ; but a wiselike thing 
is a wiselike thing. Poor Barbara ! ” 


BLINDPITS. 


251 


“ Why poor ? I don’t believe she would have had me if I 
had asked her. A woman who has made up her mind not to 
marry is not likely to change it for me.” 

“ Weel, James, I wish you joy. She hasna a fault hut 
youth, and that’s aye mending. It’s been you she’s been 
watching for a day. She wad sit and starve hersel’ in that 
window.” 

A glow of happiness overspread Mr. Grant’s face. It is 
very u sweet to think an eye will watch our coming, and look 
brighter when we come,” and it was something new to him. 

“ You’ll be gaun up the stair to see after her music, are 
ye ? ” said Miss Boston, good-naturedly ; and possibly Mr. 
Grant forgot the momentous will, for certainly he forsook the 
old lady for the young one. And, after this, the public knew 
that Mr. Grant was devoting himself to Miss Boston more 
than ever. Dr. Grant was glad that his father defied public 
opinion; for if you have plenty of money you can afford to 
snap your fingers at public opinion — not to mention, that 
public opinion generally sets in genially, for all practical pur- 
poses, towards the man with the heavy purse. 


CHAPTEK XXXII. 


Christmas had come round again, and Barbara Barclay 
had her so-called holidays once more. So-called, for when she 
did not labor abroad she labored doubly at home, to bring up 
all her arrears of different hinds of work. She had often ques- 
tioned the wisdom of allowing Bessie to remain so long at 
Heatlierburgh, and had positively limited her stay to the end 
of the Christmas holidays. Her mother inveighed against 
hurrying the child home. “ No doubt she was enjoying her- 
self, and making her footing secure where she was; and that 
Miss Boston and the Grants were so kind , to her, gave her 
(Mrs. Barclay,) a better idea of human nature.” 

“ I know, Mrs. Barclay,” said Miss Dobbie, “ that you 
don’t value Miss Davie so highly as I do, never having had 
the privilege of knowing her; but, at the present moment, I 
recall a saying of hers, which I can’t help repeating. She 
used to say, 1 Jane, our estimate of human nature depends on 
the spectacles we look through ; ’ 'meaning ” 

“ Yes, yes ; we can guess her meaning,” said Mrs. Barclay, 
impatiently ; “ a wonderful woman ; you should publish a 
sketch of her, and a collection of her sayings.” 

“ I’ve thought it a pity such a person should be lost to the 
world ; but she was the last woman who would have wished to 
be dragged before the public, even if I had the ability to do it, 
which I have not.” 

“It’s a mercy — there’s always something to be thankful 
for,” muttered Mrs. Barclay. 

The weather was hideous at Ironburgh, a fog sat on the 


BLINPPITS. 


253 


city that made a darkness which was Egyptian. At noonday 
you could not see a cart of hay at the distance of half-a-yard, 
and the lamps barely indicated their existence when you 
looked up at them from the foot of the lamp-post. One w T ould 
think nobody went out that could stay in. Miss Barclay was 
glad her occupations lay indoors, and went about them 
cheerily, making little alterations and improvements to sur- 
prise Bessie when she came hack. It gladdened her to think 
of her return after such a long absence. On this particular 
day she felt very happy and thankful, happy at the prospect 
of seeing Bessie, and thankful when she contrasted her own 
bright little parlor and cosy tea-table with the hare desolate 
misery which she knew that dense fog shrouded in many 
parts of the city^. Even Mrs. Barclay was rather genial at 
tea-time. Mr. Pods had been exercising his early handi- 
craft, and with his wife’s permission and approval, had handed 
in some shortbread as a Christmas offering. Mrs. Barclay was 
pleased, and that is a more remarkable statement than even 
Milton made when he said Silence was pleased. Eew people 
hut Milton could have said that, hut for anything a level 
capacity like mine knows, Silence may he easily pleased, and 
Mrs. Barclay was not; besides, her good humor was im- 
mensely tried by Miss Dohhie finding necessity laid upon her 
to refer to the excellent qualities of the shortbread that had 
gone to promote the enjoyment of the hoarders in the Davie 
establishment ; hut even that hitch was got over, and the 
ladies settled amicably to backgammon, at which Miss Dohhie 
invariably allowed herself to he beaten. Mrs. Barclay could 
not tolerate anything else. After the game the widow lay 
hack in her chair and slept. 

Barbara heard a sharp ring at the house door-hell, and 
in a minute Katie came in and laid a letter before her. It 
was seldom that letters came at that hour, and never that one 
came from Heatherburgh. Barbara opened it without the 
slightest expectation that it could he anything of importance. 
She glanced over it and grew very pale, and thrusting it 
hastily into her pocket, looked at her mother, who was still 


254 


BLINDPITS. 


asleep. Being human, and without affairs of her own, it is 
likely that Miss Dobbie felt a little curiosity ; but, as may be 
supposed, she was not so unladylike as to betray it. Barbara 
sat, with one cheek burning and the other white as paper, 
sewing rapidly. The letter was from that terrible ogre to an 
unprotected female — a man of business — and to the effect that 
his client, Mr. Blank, being dead, a note of her debt of £160 
had been found among his papers; that his heirs wished it 
paid up immediately ; that he hoped this would be perfectly 
convenient for her, and that no farther steps would need to be 
taken. 

She had a little money before her hand — a mere fraction 
compared with the amount of her debt, and what steps the 
law could take she hardly knew. She shuddered at the word 
ee steps,” — what did it mean ? Possibly the arrest of her 
salary in her employers’ hands, or the sale of her household 
furniture ; that, including what her mother called “ the plate,” 
might probably bring £100. It was a frightful gulf to look 
into. Surely no human being could be so unmerciful as that ; 
yet what else could such a threat mean but some snch proceed- 
ing ? To try to borrow the money elsewhere was useless, for 
who lends without security ? 

“ Try Miss Boston,” sheer Necessity said. “ Is there no 
other possible way ? ” said Pride. 

u None,” answered Necessity. “ I would do anything 
rather than that,” said Pride. 

“ Very well, if there’s anything else you can do,” rejoined 
Necessity. 

She thought of the way in which Miss Boston lived, of her 
grudging half-a-crown to a benevolent purpose, of her excita- 
ble temper, and she could not do it. To go begging to the 
only kinswoman she had, and probably shut the door that had 
been so recently opened ; to explain matters ; to humble her- 
self altogether — she could not do it. 

She rose and went to the window, and looked out, as if she 
was to get any new light there. There was nothing but the 
blackness of darkness. She looked round the cheery room 


BLINDPITS. 


255 


which was home, to her mother quietly sleeping, and thought 
of Bessie. " I must do it,” she thought. “ I can hut try — 
alone I might get over this ; but I must do it for them.” 

“ Mother,” she said, when Mrs. Barclay awoke, “ I’ve been 
thinking of going to Blindpits, what do you think of the pro- 
posal ? ” 

“ What do I think ? I daresay your memory is failing. It 
was only the day before yesterday that I suggested you should 
pay Miss Boston a visit, and you had so many objections that 
of course I held my tongue.” 

“ I’ve been thinking of it again, and I’ll go. I can bring 
Bessie back with me. I may as well go to-morrow, I dare- 
say.” 

“ I know of nothing to hinder,” said Mrs. Barclay. 

“ The weather,” said Miss Dobbie. “ It’s not wholesome. 
Besides, the trains might run into each other.” 

“ Nonsense,” said Mrs. Barclay, “ it will be clear enough in 
the country. I daresay it’s clear at the west end. It’s only 
in this wretched locality that we’re stewed in summer and 
suffocated in winter.” 

Barbara slept and waked many times that night. If she 
had been possessed of much insight into character, she might 
have taken heart of grace, or if she had been of a very hope- 
ful temperament ; but her experience hitherto had been mostly 
on the shady side. She herself had many a generous impulse ; 
but sometimes she wondered, if she had had the means of 
carrying them into action, whether they would die out. She 
thought it possible — she had seen instances of that happening. 
If Miss Boston failed her, what then ? She did not dare to 
answer that question. She shrank from the journey. As she 
dressed by gas-light, she tried to reason that, after all, it was 
no such great thing to ask a loan, that Miss Boston was 
human, that she had plenty of money; such a sum as she 
wanted was nothing to her. But it wouldn’t do; she felt 
when she saw Miss Boston as if her tongue would refuse its 
office. Then, suppose her errand told, would Miss Boston 
cross-examine her on the circumstances, reproach her for her 


256 


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folly and improvidence, and give lier a lecture seasoned with 
such sarcastic speeches as she sometimes showered about the 
ears of the meek Misses Stark ? She would have done almost 
anything rather than undertake that journey. She hurriedly 
pushed a few things into a small leather travelling-bag. She 
did not intend to stay above a day or two ; then went to her 
desk to get paper, etc., as the Blindpits supplies of that kind 
were not extensive. She took out what she wanted — and 
something more as it afterwards appeared — and put it in a 
side pocket of the bag which locked, and she locked it. It 
was very rarely, indeed, that Miss Barclay did not know 
thoroughly what she was about ; but on this morning, although 
she looked as composed as usual, and her manner was in no 
way fluttered, she must have felt agitated and preoccupied. 

When she went out, she was met by a dead wall of fog, 
denser than it had been on the preceding day even. She 
could see the dim outline of a person passing, but that was all. 
Pew shops were open, and the silence felt ominous. She 
walked on, however, and suddenly became conscious that she 
had lost herself, which she had not thought it possible she could 
do in the streets of Ironburgh ; but that was a small annoy- 
ance in present circumstances. She accosted a workman pass- 
ing, and asked if he could take her to the nearest cab-stand. 
“ Cabstand ! ” he said ; “ there’s no a cab on a’ the streets o’ 
Ironburgh this morning ; neither man nor beast could stand 
it ; but I’ll be passing a cab-office, and ye can get ane there if 
ye like.” She thanked the man, and went rapidly on with 
him. The office was open, but she had to wait for a carriage. 
The walls of the little, bare, dirty room were ornamented by 
black and white pictures of hearses (the cab-proprietor was 
also an undertaker), drawn by two, four, and six spirited horses 
— tamed, however, to a sense of their position — with long trains 
of mourning carriages behind, dwindling in the distance, and 
sketches of several of the Ironburgh cemeteries, in which the 
trees and mounments were of similar size. These had not a 
cheerful effect on Miss Barclay. A man, rosy, well-fed ard 
well-clad, and eminently cheerful looking, scratched away with 


BLINDPITS. 


257 


his pen behind a railing opposite her. He looked up and 
said, “ Dull weather.” “Very,” she said. But neither dull 
weather nor dull care seemed to have anything to do with him. 
He surveyed Miss Barclay, for he thought it must he a matter 
of life or death that caused a lady to venture out on such a 
morning. The carriage still not making its appearance, he 
kept himself actively in countenance by handling and looking 
at some piles of shiny black tacks that lay near him ; but 
they conveyed no dismal ideas to him — all men think all men 
mortal but themselves, and pre-eminently, all undertaker’s men 
do. At last Barbara stepped out of this grim chamber into the 
grim fog, and, reaching the station in ample time, was soon 
rushing to her destination at a rate that might have satisfied 
her if she had been in the last stage of anxiety to get to it. 

The short December day was closing in when she passed 
through the gate at the Ileatherburgh station once more. Bars 
of light lay along the western hills, behind which the sun had 
sunk, and all else -was gray and still — gray and still and 
serene — with a touch of frost in the wholesome fresh air, and 
a star beginning to glow here and there out of the increas- 
ing darkness. 

Yery likely Barbara’s reflection on the last stage of her 
journey towards Miss Boston did not indicate that high order 
of mind which can accept an obligation and not feel obliged, 
which looks upon gold as mere yellow dust, and can borrow 
freely (if any one can be found to lend freely) without a pang. 
Barbara’s intellect had not climbed to that platform ; all her 
wisdom on the subject was embodied in the proverb, “ He that 
goes a-borrowing goes a-sorrowing.” 

At length she is in front of the paint-blistered door. Bell 
opens and looks surprised, but on the whole not ill pleased. 
She is ushered to the presence. Miss Boston, hearing some 
one come in, lifts one of the candles with the long noses, and, 
holding it on high, looks at her visitor. 

“ Barbara ! ” she exclaimed. “ Preserve me, what’s brought 
you here ? Haething has happened to the bairn, surely ?” 

"The child! what child?” asked Barbara, not forgetting 


258 


BLINDPITS. 


even ii tliat supreme moment, her mission to speak the Eng- 
lish language with propriety. 

“ Bessie ; hut ye’ll hae crossed her on the road, to he sure. 
She gaed to Ironhurgh the day. She wanted to see you.” 

“ She wanted to see me ! ” said Barbara, not without a 
feeling of gratification. “ But why did she leave so suddenly ? 
She has not said anything imprudent, I hope, that might give 
offence. My mother has prejudices against Mr. Grant. She 
has not repeated anything of that kind? ” 

“Ha, na; it’s no Mr. Grant that’s offended, nor ony ither 
body ; but she’ll write the night, I’se warrant, and ye’ll get it 
the morn, nae doubt.” 

“I hope so. I feel quite uneasy about her, she is so 
thoughtless, at least about every-day matters.” 

“ To my notion, she has ower muckle thought for her age ; 
but ye needna be uneasy about her, she’s safe in Ironhurgh 
lang or this.” 

“ I hope she is safe home. When I left Ironhurgh this 
morning the fog was so thick that I lost myself in the 
streets.” 

“We ken naething about that here ; but, bairn, I take it 
kind o’ ye coming to see me at the risk o’ losing yersel’.” 

“0 Miss Boston, don’t say that. You would not say that 
if you knew ; ” and she stopped, choked by the recurring 
sense of her own position, and ashamed to tell her errand. 
She looked distressed, and Miss Boston saw it. From the first 
she had surmised some cause for the visit, and she had con- 
nected it with Bessie, till she remembered Barbara could not 
have seen her. Then she was at a loss to account for it. 
That the prudent Barbara could be in any money difficulty 
did not occur to her. She came nearer Barbara, and said, 
“Bairn, ye’re vexed about something. Weel, folk whiles 
come to me wi’ their grievances, but what can the like o’ me 
do for them ? They say auld folk grow dull in the feelings, 
and it may be sae — it may be sae. I ken they dinna greet, 
Barbara, at least I canna ; but if there’s onything ye think I 
can do for ye, I havena forgotten last Christmas yet, auld and 
donnert as I am.” 


BLINDPITS. 


259 


Barbara listened like a bare sitting in the middle of a 
country road, and ber spirit died within her as she heard Miss 
Boston say people came to her and she could do nothing for 
them. It seemed like waving her off; but the end of her 
speech was more encouraging, and she was desperate. 

“ Miss Boston,” she said, u I am in a great difficulty. 
Nothing but the most absolute necessity would have brought 
me here to-day on the errand I have come. I assure you, I 

have not been in the habit of” and she stopped, while her 

face grew hot as fire. How many beggars had accosted her 
who told her they were wdiolly unused to it, and had never 
done it before ? and she was only begging on a larger scale. 

“ What can it be ? ” thought Miss Boston ; but she only 
looked at Barbara, who said no more, and had begun to throw 
off her cloak and bonnet in as reckless a way as Bessie could 
have done. 

“ Is your mother well ? ” said Miss Boston. 

“ Yes, yes, thank you ; she is well.” 

“ What is’t that’s vexin’ ye then, Barbara ? ” 

“ Miss Boston,” said she, making a final effort, “ I am one 
hundred and sixty pounds in debt. If I don’t pay it immedi- 
ately, the people are going to take steps to make me do it. 
Everything I have in the world put together would not nearly 
make it up ” 

“ Bairn, ye gied me a gliff. I thought something horrible 
had happened ; but that’s a’. Ye surely didna think I would 
stick at the like o’ that, nor twice that, nor four times that. 
Siller’s done sae little for me that I am aye glad when it can 
do onything for ony ither body. Gae ’way up the stair to my 
room — there’s a gude fire in’t. If ye saw yer collar, ye wad 
be wantin’ to put it straight, although there’s naebody but me 
to look at it, and I dinna mind; but dinna put off yer time, 
Bell’s just bringing the tea.” 

Barbara was not past “ greetin’,” although she did not cry 
often ; and once up stairs, she shed tears of pure relief and 
gratitude. Like her mother, she had a better opinion of 
human nature. Kindness certainly falls on the fainting spirit 


260 


BLINDPITS. 


like rain on the mown grass. The cloud that had so many 
years made a leaden atmosphere round her, and had at last 
hurst on her, as she often feared, had suddenly broken up, 
. and left bright sunshine and a blue sky. She felt buoyant 
and elastic. If ever Miss Boston tasted the pleasure of doing 
good, it must have been that night watching Barbara’s face. 

She thought it right and proper to make a grateful speech, 
although she could not convey the tenth part of her gratitude 
in words or in any other way, still she desired to make an 
acknowledgment. 

“ Miss Boston,” she said, u I shall never forget the kind and 
generous manner in which you have received me to-night. In 
time I may possibly be able to repay the money; but I am 
sure, as long as I live the remembrance of this visit to Blind- 
pits will never fade ” — 

“'Weel, Barbara, I’ll no say but it’s pleasant to ken that 
somebody wilf think kindly o’ us when we are alow the sod; 
but as for the siller, it’s no worth speaking o’ ” — 

“ That’s because you never felt the want of it, Miss Boston. 
I don’t set much value on money myself, and I don’t wish for 
much of it; but a certain portion we must have, and it is 
sometimes difficult to get, especially for a woman. And when 
you need it and can’t get it — there may be nobler trials in the 
world — I know there are but few that crush the energies more 
than this. Begging is a wretched trade.” 

“ They tell me no — that folk mak a heap o’ siller at it ; 
and if folk can mak siller ony way short o’ stealing, it’s a’ 
right. But the pride some folk hae to contend wi’ ! Was the 
like o’ you asking the like o’ me for some siller onything to be 
ashamed o’ ? or is me gien it onything to boast o’ ? And, 
Barbara, as I wadna like the light picket out o’ yer een wi’ 
care — care killed a cat, ye ken — I may as weel tell ye that 
I’ve been makin’ my will, and I’ve left this place to you — the 
ground, and the house and a’tliing in’t ; and ye need hae nae 
compunction o’ turning it inside out, and bringing things 
abreast o’ the age, as Mrs. Gascoigne wad say. For if I 
happen to ken o’t, it’ll no put me about ; I’ll be glad that ye’re 


BLINDPITS. 


263 


comfortable. And I havena forgotten Bessie, nor yer mother 
either.” 

Barbara was struck dumb. The English language failed 
her for once. 

“There’s ae thing, though,” Miss Boston went on; “I wad 
like ye to let the swallows big in the window neuks ; they’ve 
bigget there now for seventy years to my knowledge. I wad 
like to think o’ them being there. I’ve had my lifetime o’t, 
Barbara, and ye’ll hae yours, and then we’ll disappear like the 
swallows, and it’s little matter if we cast up in an everlasting 
simmer.” 

“ That’s our hope, Miss Boston — our grand hope. Still, as 
long as we are in this world, the things nearest us will assume 
undue proportions, and you have relieved the gnawing anxiety 
of my life. It is vain for me to try to express my gratitude — 
I trust I may live to show it'.” 

“ Ho to me, Barbara — no to me. My sands are gey near 
run ; ye’ll no be keepit lang out o’ yer inheritance. And I 
am no sure, after a’, that gratitude is called for. I canna tak 
onything wi’ me, ye ken, or I wadna answer for mysel’.” 

“ But you might have left it differently,” said the practical 
Barbara. 

“ That’s true ; but I’ve tried to leave it as I thought wad 
tell best when I had to account for’t. So ye see we’re about 
even yet, Barbara. It doesna do to look ower close into 
human nature. That callant John Grant has a fine micro- 
scope he brought up here to let me see ae day — he’s very 
attentive — and nae doubt its wonderfu’ ; he had a fibra o’ 
leaf and bit o’ a puddock’s leg, and a heap o’ things; and 
when he was done, I says; ‘Now, John, if ye could just put a’ 
yer motives for marrying Mary M’Yicar intil’t, I would like to 
get a keek, and ye wad be nane the waur o’ studying them 
yersel’.’ He turned very red, and said, * What do you mean, 
Msis Boston ? I love Mary. You don’t suppose her money 
was any temptation ? ’ ‘I didna say that, John ; she’s a fine 
lassie, and ony man might hae been proud to marry her with 
out a bawbee.’ ” 


262 


BLINDPITS. 


a 1 I acknowledge/ he said, i that I consider her money an 
advantage — a man’s life is precarious, more especially a medi- 
cal man’s. As a widow she will be amply provided for, and 
that saves me mortal anxiety.’ ‘Aweel, in wi’ yer mortal 
anxiety for yer widow, John, and let’s see what it’s like.’ ” 

“ ‘ Really, Miss Boston, I would be angry, if I had not a 
very high respect and regard for you.’ ” 

11 1 Put them in, John — your respect and regard for me.’ ” 

“ 1 They would stand inspection, I assure you ; but your 
humor is a little peculiar.’ ” 

“ You were pretty severe upon the young man, Miss Boston. 
I don’t think I could have borne all that so calmly.” 

“ Pll no say ye wad ; but John has the virtue that he’s no 
easily provoked. I’ll say that o’ him.” 

“ But is it not a little unreasonable to expect unalloyed 
motives, Miss Boston ? I don’t think there are such things.” 

u There’s nae sic things, and I dinna expect them ; but I 
wad hae folk ken that, and be humble — that’s the best disin- 
fecting agent, as they speak about now-a-days. But, instead 
o’ that, folk blink a’ the brass among the gold, and cuddle 
themselves in self-complacency. That stocking’s at the intaks 
now, Barbara.” And from that the ladies wandered into the 
topics of knitting and worsted, etc. etc., and then fell into 
silence; a delicious silence for Barbara — silence and musing- 
is always a paradise to the happy. 

Barbara wanted to act the part of maid to her old friend 
when she went to her room. “ Na, na, bairn, I wad be glad 
o’ ye if I needed ye ; but I can manage yet, and I hope I’ll 
no live to be helpless,” and she glided into the chamber, 
where, for more than seventy years, she had got into and out 
of -her clothes. It was a thought to her now this dressing 
and undressing ; but still she went through all her little ways 
with undeviating regularity. In looking in the glass she was 
struck more than usual with her old wrinkled face and lean 
withered arms, and she smiled after a fashion, and said, “ Puir 
body ! is that you, Barbara Boston ? ” 


CHAPTER XXXIII. 


Bessie had written often to her aunt, but she had never 
revealed the fact of her engagement to Mr. Grant. She had 
an instinctive feeling that the news of their being about to 
part company, of their having different homes and different 
interests, would not be good news to her. It was a sad 
thought even to herself — how much more to her aunt ! And 
now all her meditations on her journey were how she could 
soften the matter and make her aunt share her own happiness ; 
for she could not help being supremely happy. Curiously 
enough, the first face she saw when she reached Ironburgh 
was that of Graham Richardson. He was bidding some one 
good-bye, and when in his turn he saw her stepping from the 
carriage he was beside her immediately. 

“ Is there no one to meet you ? ” he said. 

“ Nobody ; they don’t know I’m coming. I wanted to 
surprise them, and I have made a good beginning by surpris- 
ing you.” 

“ You have surprised me,” he said ; “ you are looking well 
— beautiful. You are no more like the pale little girl you 
were then — than ” 

“ Cheese is like chalk,” she said, laughing ; “ of course not. 
I’m a young lady now — don’t attempt to little girl me — be 
reverent, if you please, sir.” 

He looked at her radiant face. 

“ Reverent,” he said, “ I’ll fall down and worship, Bessie.” 

“ Just keep a gude mids, Mr. Richardson ; I declare it 
seems as if I had been away for a century — You’re not to tell 
Mr. Dods I’m here, I would like to surprise them too.” 


264 


BLINDPITS. 


: 1 don’t know as I’m capable of keeping the secret; but 
I’ll try — I suppose Miss Boston’s well — have you seen Mr. 
Grant lately ? ” 

“ The day before yesterday — he’s in England now.” 

“ You’ll know him pretty well by this time — I’m sure you 
like him ? ” 

“ Yes, I do like him.” 

" I’m glad of that, uncle’s not very young, but he’s one of 
those men that never grow old, and I knew he would suit him- 
self to a girl like you.” 

a You are possessed of marvellous prescience, Mr. Bichard- 
son — have you the gift of second sight, may I ask ? ” 

There was just a curl of sarcasm in her tone. 

“ What’s the matter, Bessie ? I’ve said nothing ajee, have 
I ?” 

“ Not at all ; Mr. Grant and I got on very well.” 

“ I have sometimes thought if he had married he might 
have been happier; even yet it might do, but I really don’t 
know a person he knows that I would like to see him marry.” 

“ But his taste may not be so very fastidious as yours.” 

“ 0 yes, he is very fastidious, although you might not think 
it.” 

Bessie recovered her good humor, and laughed a melodious 
little laugh when she parted with Graham. 

She walked into the familiar parlor, which seemed to have 
shrunk into the dimensions of a band-box in her absence ; and 
looking eagerly round, said, “ Where’s aunt ? ” 

Both ladies looked up in breathless astonishment. 

“ Yes, it’s just me, grandmamma. How well you are look- 
ing ; and you too, Miss Dobbie. I’m glad I have astonished 
you. I have been counting on it all day ; where’s aunt ? ” 

“ She’s away to Blindpits,” said the ladies in one voice. 

“ Blindpits ! then we’ve crossed each other on the way — 
how provoking ! did she mean to stay long ? ” 

u I imagine not ; but it’s difficult to tell what Barbara 
means.” 

At this the old atmosphere laid hold on Bessie at once, and 
it was not exhilarating. 


BLINDPITS. 


265 


“ And how is your dear old friend at Blindpits ? ” said Miss 
Dobbie. 

“ Sit down by me, Bessie, my dear,” said her grandmamma ; 
u perhaps I may get some satisfactory information from you ; 
is Barbara Boston in her senses, or is she imbecile ? ” 

“ Imbecile ! Grandmamma, I don’t wish she heard you ; 
people yonder think her a strong-minded acute person, I assure 
you.” 

“ Then, have you not got any hint as i;o the terms of her 
will ? ” 

u Ko, I had forgotten she had a will.” 

u But you know she has made a will ? ” 

“I’ve heard you often speak of it — I don’t know of it 
otherwise.” 

“ Deplorable ! ” muttered Mrs. Barclay. “ And the Grants, 
father and son, are as often at Blindpits as ever ? ” 

“ They are a good deal there — at least Mr. Grant.” 

“ Toadying the foolish old woman all his might, I have no 
doubt.” 

“Now, grandmamma, don’t speak in that way, please ; they 
have all been very kind to me ; and ” 

“ Kind ! poor thing ! 0, Miss Dobbie, is it not singular 
that our family should not have a shred of worldly wisdom ? 
— they haven’t even the natural love of fair play.” 

“ Well, Mrs. Barclay, I really don’t know if it is ; qualities 
as well as diseases are said to miss one generation and come 
out in another.” • 

Bessie had escaped to the kitchen, and was renewing her 
early friendship with Katie. 

Kext evening Mrs. Barclay had a note from Barbara — a 
memorable note : 

“ My Dear Mother — I trust Bessie has arrived safely at 
her destination ; it was rather remarkable that she should go 
to Ironburgh the day I came here, but we shall meet in good 
time. I take the first opportunity of informing you with 
regard to a subject about which you have long desired infor- 
12 


266 


BLINDPITS. 


mation. Miss Boston told me last night that she had made 
her will, and had left this place, Blindpits, to me ; and she 
said, 1 1 have not forgotten your mother and Bessie.’ I give 
you her own words. I need not say how deeply grateful I 
am. Miss Boston seems remarkably well at present ; but one 
can never say what a day may bring forth. Life, uncertain 
at all times, is doubly so when we have reached and passed 
the threescore-and-ten ; hut I fondly trust Miss Boston will 
live for many years yet. I shall remain here till the close of 
the holidays. — I am, dear mother, your affectionate daughter, 

Barbara Barclay.” 

“ That is good news, indeed, Mrs. Barclay. I need not say 
I enjoy your prospects as if they were my qwn,” broke forth 
Miss Dobbie warmly. 

“ It is exquisitely good,” said Bessie. “ I could have wished 
no better arrangement than Aunt Barbara at Blindpits. I did 
not expect Miss Boston to leave me a penny. I hope, as aunt 
says, that she’ll live for many a year.” 

“I see nothing either good or exquisite in it,” said Mrs. 
Barclay. “ It is better certainly than if we were to be all 
beggars ; and I can be glad for Barbara’s sake, although it 
seems she can’t be sorry for the small mercy to me of not be- 
ing forgotten.” 

Mrs. Barclay was no doubt chagrined at the terms of the 
'will ; but even she could not but be thankful for a certainty as 
to the future. 

Barbara had only been a day or two at Blindpits when Miss 
Boston took a cold, not so severe as she had at the same time 
the previous year ; and having profited by experience, she was 
induced to remain in bed, and take care of herself in time. 
Barbara proposed sending for the doctor, but that she would 
not permit, remarking that she could better thole his visits 
when she was weel than when she was ill. “ You and me, Bar- 
bara, ’ill manage a cauld as weel as the doctor, if M’Vicar and 
Grant were baith here, and they’ll baith be here as soon as 
they get wind o’ the thing. They could only sit, and look 
wise, and say — 


BLJNDPITS. 


267 


“‘Keep in your bed, Miss Boston, by all means keep in 
your bed ; and if the cough gets troublesome, apply mustard.’ 
They wad hae the table covered wi’ bottles, and phials and 
glasses, or ever ye could say Jack Bobinson.” 

“ I think you undervalue medical men, Miss Boston,” said 
Barbara. 

“ Maybe, maybe ; it’s been ane o’ the misfortunes o’ my life, 
I daursav, that I never could steek my een on humbug.” 

“ It certainly is not a pleasant thing to think one is imposed 
on ; and merely on the ground of our own comfort, it is better 
to cultivate the charity that thinketh no evil.” 

“ A wonderfu’ heap better, Barbara ; but mind ye I’m no 
thinking evil o’ our doctors a’thegether. I mak’ no doubt they 
do their best. They’ll no kill onybody if they can help it. Ye 
mind, Barbara, it is Addison that says of doctors — ‘ Some kill 
in chariots, some on horses ; ” and the old lady smiled at the 
compact stroke of irony. 

Barbara smiled too. 

“ It’s no doubt clever ; but medical science has made great 
progress since Addison’s day.” 

“ There can be nae question o’ that ; but the experience o’ 
the past is often wonderfully pat to the present. Open 
Shakspeare, and for a’ the progress that’s been, ye might 
think the man had lived yesterday.” 

“ He’s highly spoken of, I believe,” said Barbara. 

Yes, she said that; and that is just the style of remark 
that many excellent women will make, which leads people 
(often wickeder) to hold their tongue. It had that effect on 
Miss Boston. “ James Grant was right after a’ ; Bessie ’ill 
mak’ a shorter winter night,” she thought. “Yet Barbara is 
wise and gude, and thoughtfu’. She wad hae made him a 
gude wife ; but it is as it should be, nae doubt.” 

Miss Boston was aware that Barbara did not know of 
Bessie’s engagement, and she had not the gratification of . 
talking it over with her, supposing correctly that Bessie 
would wish to give her the information herself. Her impres- 
sion was, that her own plan would have been much the best ; 


268 


BLINDPITS. 


and every time she looked at Barbara’s serene placid face, she 
was confirmed in that impression ; but she took kindly to the 
actual circumstances for all that. She had the questionable 
idea that people were hardly accountable for their likes and 
dislikes. Perhaps this was the only ground on which she 
could excuse to herself her own unintelligible mistake — and 
human nature dearly loves a back door to crawl out at. 


CHAPTER XXXIV. 


Miss Boston’s allowing herself to go out in kindly action 
to Barbara had a gracious effect on both. A pretense of feel- 
ing, or of exaggerated feeling, is wicked. A constant sup- 
pression or repression of feeling is not much better. If 
people feel kindly and lovingly towards others, why not show 
it ? and yet to some natures this is hardly possible. Miss 
Boston was pleased with her own act, and she lay quietly and 
was served by Barbara, each drawn more closely to the other 
than they ever were before. Her cookery especially gave 
great satisfaction, for the old lady was sure of its delicate 
cleanliness ; and it and Barbara together reminded her of her 
grandmother, and an illness she had had when a child. She 
leaped a chasm of seventy years to go back and dwell on this 
the sunniest spot of her existence, for her grandmother had 
cherished and made a pet of her, which no human being had 
done since. She described the house and the garden, and 
11 the burn she had paidled in,” and the children that were 
her companions, a’ dead lang syne ! she said. Then, fearing 
she was betraying weakness — that it might be thought she 
was lapsing into second childhood — she would make a caustic 
remark about something, and be her ordinary self again. 
Some days passed, and although no worse, and to appearance 
rather better, Miss Boston showed no inclination to leave her 
bed — a very remarkable thing in her. When Barbara pro- 
posed her sitting up for a little, she said, te We’ll see the morn. 
I canna be fashed the day. What’s that at the side of the 
fire ? ” looking across. 

“ It’s your beef-tea — I’ve cooked it here to be sure it’s all 
right.” 


270 


BLINDPITS. 


“ You’re very kind, Barbara — ye tak’ a heap o’ trouble.” 

Miss Barclay took the mess down stairs to dish it, and 
removed the lid of the pan as she entered the kitchen-door. 
She had barely time to lay it on the table when she was con- 
fronted by Mr. Pettigrew, who had been sitting at the other 
end of it. 

“ Being in the district, I looked in to see my cousin,” he 
said ; “ not but what I had a notion that you were here. I 
hope your aunt is coming round again.” 

“ Miss Boston, you mean ; thank you, I hope so. Bell,” 
she said good-naturedly, looking at that individual, who was 
on the top of a table in a closet cleaning down shelves, “ I 
think you might stop that work when you have a visitor.” 

“ Pm just about done. I dinna care for stopping in the 
middle o’ a job, and Peter’s no run for time, I daursay.” 

Thinking that Miss Boston’s dinner might be getting cold, 
Barbara set it on the fire till she went to the dining-room for 
a basin to hold it. She staid some minutes considering 
whether she ought to extend any attention to Mr. Pettigrew 
or not, and concluded that, as she was engaged wutli Miss 
Boston, and he was Belle’s visitor, she was not called upon to 
bore herself with him. When she went back, Mr. Pettigrew 
was on his seat, Bell was in the closet, and the saucepan was 
boiling on the fire, exactly where she left it. Thinking over 
it after, she was perfectly sure of this. She was half-way up 
stairs when she remembered she had not a spoon, and she set 
the tray with the basin down on the sill of the staircase win- 
dow, and descended to the dining-room again. She was in 
the closet getting a spoon when the house-door opened, then 
some one entered and looked into the room, — she heard, for 
she did not see, being in the closet, — and then went up stairs 
and stopped, — stopped in the middle of the stair for a minute, 
— she was sure of this, for she was listening. There was a 
tap at Miss Boston’s cliamber-door, and on the words “ Come 
in,” from her, Mr. Grant entered. 

“ In bed ? What’s happened, Miss Boston ? Where’s 
Bessie ? ” 


BLINDP1TS. 


271 


“James Grant ! ” said Miss Boston ; “I thought ye wasna 
to he hame till next week. Ye’ve got yer business soon 
owr.” 

“ No, I haven’t ; I’m going hack to-morrow. Where’s 
Bessie ? ” 

“ She’s in Ironburgh.” 

“Ironburgh?* You don’t mean to say you let her go to 
Ironburgh, and alone ? ” 

“ I mean to say that ye wad hardly expect me to gang wi’ 
her.” 

“I did not believe you could have been so foolish, Miss 
Boston.” 

Miss Boston raised herself in bed. 

“ I w r ad be angry, James, if it wasna that ye’re no rational. 
A man to leave his business half-done, and come a’ this gate 
to gang back the morn again, and then to scold me, as if I 
could keep the lassie a prisoner ! As for gaun her lane, she 
cam’ her lane; an’ she’s neither sugar nor saut — she’ll no 
melt.” 

“ Melt ! and were you in bed when she ran away ? ” 

“ No, I wasna. But I’ve gotten her aunt wi’ me, and she’s 
worth baith you and her for common sense — nane o’ yer rash 
fit-and-start folk, that ye dinna ken what they’re gaun to do 
next.” 

“ Did she walk to the station ? ” 

“ It’s likely, unless she flew.” 

“ Have you heard from her since ? ” 

“ Ay, there’s a bit note — that’s it on the drawers’ head, I 
think.” 

Mr. Grant had it in his hand instantly. He read — 

“ Dearest Auntie — Fancy that you and I should pass, and 
not feel en rapport . I was wearying to tell you all about it — 
how it began and how it ended, and will when we meet soon. 
Love from us to you both. — Yours, Bessie Barclay.” 

Miss Barclay came into the room as he finished reading it. 
He met her with frank cordiality, and said — 


272 


BLINDPITS. 


“ I have taken the liberty of reading this note, Miss Bar- 
clay.” 

“ Oh, Bessie’s ? She is not altogether a satisfactory corres- 
pondent. I am afraid you’ll think it not very correctly ex- 
pressed, hut that’s mere carelessness ; it is not that she does 
not know better.” 

“ It can’t he better,” he said ; and he quietly stole the pre- 
cious scrap. 

“ Perhaps you did not observe that she begins by addressing 
me only, and ends by saying 1 love to you both.’ Of course I 
know what she means ; but her carelessness is extreme — much 
more than is usual with her.” 

“ I’m glad to hear that, Miss Boston. Miss Barclay says 
her niece is not always equally careless ; but I’ll not keep you 
from your dinner now. I’ll see you to-morrow before I go.” 

11 Do that, J ames ; and mind ye hae my best wishes, al- 
though you’ve said what I wadna tak’ frae ilka ane. Only, I 
dinna consider ye altogether responsible the now ; but mind, 
come what will, ye’ve my best wishes.” 

u I am sure of it,” he said heartily ; and he bent down and 
kissed the withered hand she held out to him. 

Barbara was not curious or ingenious in ferreting out things 
that no ways concerned her ; so, if she gave any consideration 
as to what this little demonstration might mean, it was only 
momentary. 

Mr. Grant drew her from the room. 

“ I’m glad you’re here,” he said ; “ how long has Miss Bos- 
ton been ill ? but it can’t have been long. She appears to be 
a good deal shaken.” 

“Do you think so ? Her worst symptom seems to me to be 
her willingness to lie in bed ; it shows a loss of vitality, I fear, 
but she won’t allow the doctor to be sent for.” 

“You must just try and keep up her strength, I don’t 
know what more a doctor could do ; but if I see M’Vicar or 
John I’ll give them a hint.” 

“I wish you would, it would be a great satisfaction to me.” 

“ She’s an old and valued friend of mine,” said Mr. Grant 
musingly ; then cheerfully, “ Well, good-bye, Miss Barclay, 


BLTNDPITS. 273 

I’ll be here early to-morrow, and if your patient is not more 
like herself, I’ll argue her into a doctor, no fear.” 

When she went hack, Miss Boston had raised herself in bed, 
and she said — “ I’m a’ ready, gie me my denner, Barbara, I’m 
hungry.” 

“ That’s a good sign,” said Barbara; “I hope you’ll find 
your soup to your taste.” 

“ It’s fine,” she said, taking a spoonful, “ and tasty to my 
wersh mouth,” but she could not finish it. “Ha, na,” she 
said, “ I mauna be greedy ; eneuch’s as gude’s a feast ; now 
I’ll lie still and get a sleep. It’s a’ I’m gude for, now, I 
think.” And she slept most of the afternoon. 

Miss J ane Stark came in, and she and Barbara held long 
and close confab, the latter impressing her visitor.so favorably, 
that she declared to her sister, when she went home, that Miss 
Barclay was a person of singular excellence and beauty of char- 
acter. Then Miss Boston awoke. Miss Jane hoped that her 
old friend felt better. But Miss Boston said no, she could not 
say she felt very comfortable. 

“ Then, don’t you think, dear Miss Boston, you should have 
the doctor. Such an old and tried man as Dr. M’Vicar, or 
Dr. Grant, fresh from all the latest science ; would it not be 
wise, think you ? ” 

“ Maybe it wad. But what wad they do, think you, Jean ? 
They couldna put me into a mill and grind me young again.” 

“Ho, they can’t work miracles; but they might suggest 
something you would be the better for.” 

“ You see,” said Barbara, as she showed Miss Jane down 
stairs, “ how set she is against having a doctor. I’ve given 
up speaking about it in the meantime.” 

“ I think you are wrong, my dear Miss Barclay. If I were 
you I would have a doctor. It saves reflections.” 

“Yes, it does that. I think one of the doctors will drop in 
soon, probably. She’s evidently better to-day. She has 
taken her food with relish and slept quietly.” 

“ It’s such a blessing that you are here ” — and Miss J ane 
shook hands warmly. 

12 * 


CHAPTEB XXXV. 


When - Barbara returned tbe old lady still lay quietly, and 
she supposed she was asleep, till she said — 

“ Barbara, have you lookit at the papers the day ? ” 

“ Yes, I glanced them over.” 

u Is there ony word o’ the cholera ? is’t spreadin’ ? ” 

“ Hot much. There have been cases here and there sup- 
posed to have been cholera ; but you know people are easily 
alarmed and apt to exaggerate, especially knowing that it’s in 
the country.” 

“Hae wonder. It’s a fell disease.” She lay, moving rest- 
lessly, for a time. Then she suddenly threw down the bed- 
clothes and sprang up — “ I can thole this nae langer. If it’s 
no cholera, then it’s something waur.” 

Barbara ran to her, and held her up in bed, while she 
retched violently. She seemed in great suffering, which 
passed off in some degree after a little, and she lay down, her 
face pinched and ghastly — and a shudder through all her body. 
Barbara rang the bell, and when the servant came she said, 
“ Is David in the kitchen ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“ Well, tell him to go to Heatherburgh as fast as he can, 
and ask Dr. M’ Vicar or Dr. Grant to come here immediately. 
You comprehend the message thoroughly ? ” 

“ Yes, ma’am ; is the mistress waur ?” 

“ Bather, and she would like to see the doctor at once ; be 
sure and make David understand that.” 

“ He’ll understand weel eneuch,” said Miss Boston, who was 


BLINDPITS. 


275 


reviving a little ; “ he’s no sae dull in the uptak ; the doctor 
may be a comfort to you, Barbara, hut I’m sure he needna 
come if he has a mair hopefu’ case on hand.” 

“ It’s probably just a bilious attack you have had, and you’ll 
he relieved a little now, are you ? ” 

“ I can feel I’m no done wi’t, Barbara.” 

She lay still again for a time, then another paroxysm of 
suffering came on ; when she came out of it, she looked at 
Barbara and said — “ This canna last. As lang as I hae my 
senses, Barbara, gang to the little upper drawer, next the fire, 
and in the left-hand corner, next the hack, there’s a pocket- 
book, bring it to me. Now,” she said, when she had opened 
it , — u there’s notes for £200, put them in your pocket. It may 
he a while or things are settled up. Ye’ll need them.” 

(i 0 Miss Boston,” said Barbara, the tears starting to her 
eyes, “ it’s too much kindness ! ” 

“ What’s siller to me, Barbara ? ” she said, with solemnity 
touched with sarcasm. 

“ I mean,” said Barbara, “ don’t think of these things at 
present.” 

“ Weel, that’s a’, Barbara. I’m done wi’ this warld now.” 

Bell came into the room and said, “ Davie had come hack. 
Dr. MWicar was at Middleburgh, no to he hame for a day or 
twa ; that Dr. Grant was some place six miles away, hut Mrs. 
Grant had sent a man on a horse for him.” 

“ It’s little matter, Bell. Gi’e me some water, my throat’s 
burnin’ ” — and pain surprised a groan from her. 

“ Sirs, it’s distressing” said Bell. “ What wad it he to send 
for Wilson — he may he sober ; they say when he is, he is by 
ordinar’ skeely.” 

Barbara looked at Miss Boston and hesitated. She followed 
Bell from the room, and said, “ I don’t know whether your 
mistress would see Wilson or not. She is suffering, hut I 
think the worst is over, and I really don’t think she is in 
danger. Still — Yes, send David for Wilson. It may he as 
well.” 

Davie,” said Bell tq her fellow-servant, <( get on your 


276 


BLINDPITS. 


shoon as quick as ye like, and run to Heatherburgh for Wil- 
son.” 

“ The mistress is no waur, I hope,” said the hoy. 

“She’s no better, and that’s enough. My word, but her 
nurse takes things easy. She wasna for sendin’ for Wilson at 
first, although I telt her how clever he was.” 

“ My mother says she never heard o’ a drucken doctor that 
wasna clever,” said David. 

“ She’ll hae heard Miss Boston say that,” said Bell, “ but 
off ye go and bring him if he’s fit to come, clever or no 
clever.” 

The boy had been sitting up ready to attend the doctor’s 
horse when he should arrive, and was wakened from the 
dreamless sleep which rustics at his age can manage on a hard 
chair to the music of loud snoring. But he was concerned 
for “ the mistress ; ” she had been a kind friend to him and 
his family. 

When he reached the village he was directed to a public- 
house, as the most likely place to find the doctor, and in it he 
found him. 

“Is the doctor sober?” — he asked the girl who was attend- 
ing the customers. 

“ Pinched. Is’t a particular case ? ” 

“ Ay, very particular.” 

“ Not the auld leddy ? ” 

David nodded. 

“ What’s wrang wi’ her? — Weel he’ll no do ; he’s gey weel 
on. He’s gaun to begin his teetotal lecture, and when he’s 
that length he’s no fit for business ; but ye can judge for yer- 
sel’,” and she swept up the curtain from a small window in 
the passage, and bade David look. The door of the room was 
open, so that he also heard. The doctor was sitting in the 
oracle’s chair, describing professionally to an admiring circle 
an accident that had happened that day ; a drunken man had 
fallen before the wheel of a cart and been killed. 

“'Drink,” said the doctor, with tipsy solemnity, “drink did 
it ; that man drank rapidly,” and he lifted his glass ; “ drink 


BLINDPITS. 


277 


is bad any way, but taken rapidly it’s poison,” and be drank 
the glass. 

“ They’re a rum set in there,” said David, dropping the 
curtain. 

“ Ou, ay,” said the girl, 11 when drink’s in wit is out. Ye 
see the doctor ’ill hardly do for a leddy.” 

u Or ony ither body,” said Davie ; u he wad as like poison 
them as no.” 

“ Whist, laddie, wi’ yer poisonin’ ; the doctor has mair skill 
when he’s drunk than the ither twa wi’ a’ their senses about 
them ; but he’s no jist the thing for a leddy the now.” 

Meantime Miss Boston suffered and Barbara watched ; she 
proposed trying stimulants and opiates, but Miss Boston 
would take nothing but a mouthful of water now and then. 
Barbara held her up, and kept her arm round her, saying a 
soothing word occasionally ; beyond that they did not speak. 
At last she said — u Lay me down, Barbara ; lay me down 
now.” 

Barbara laid her gently back on the pillows and said softly, 
11 You feel relieved, Miss Boston ? I think you’ll get rest.” 

u In a wee, Barbara ; in a wee.” 

She lay very quiet, the vexed and pinched look had left her 
face, and when Barbara heard a horse gallop up to the door, 
she went to meet the doctor at the head of the stairs. 

u 0 doctor ! I’m glad you’re come at last ; but I think Miss 
Boston is better ; she has been quiet recently, and looks tran- 
quil.” 

Dr. Grant took the candle and strode to the bedside. Miss 
Boston was lying with her eyes shut ; a single tear-drop had 
forced itself through the lid and lay on her cheek ; the doctor 
took her hand and bent down his head close to her. He 
looked up at Barbara, 61 She is dead,” he said. 

Barbara was stunned. 

The doctor said, “ It has been sudden,” and he proceeded 
to inquire the particulars of her illness. Barbara gave him 
these as succinctly as she could, and without giving way to 
emotion of any kind ; that was not her way, at least in the 
presence of others, especially strangers. 


278 


BLIKDPITS. 


“ You say she thought it cholera,” said Dr. Grant, “ and 
you thought it a bilious attack, and she has had nothing since 
the beef-tea in the forenoon ? ” 

“ Nothing but water.” 

“Well, whatever it was, it does not take much to knock 
such as her over.” 

“ I never thought she was dying,” said Barbara. 

“ Did you not ? ” and he looked keenly at her. “ I wish I 
had been here sooner.”’ 

“ Could you have saved her ? ” Barbara asked anxiously. 

“ I don’t say that, but I would have been better satisfied.” 

“ It is a vain wish now, but I trust she’s in a better world.” 

“ Quite so, Miss Barclay. Well, I may go. I think there’s 
nothing I can do for you ? ” 

“ Thank you — no ; I know of nothing.” 

And when he left the room, she gazed into the face of her 
old friend. All her kindness, past and present, rushed to her 
mind, and her tears dropped fast. A few minutes ago, and 
Miss Boston could have said — 

“ Dinna greet, Barbara.” 

But, now — oh, now — the everlasting silence had fallen. 

Yes, Miss Boston had passed away from a life which 
whether she had used wisely and well is not for me to say. 
Of how man}' - people could that be said ? “A man’s life,” 
says a thoughtful writer, “is past before he has made up his 
mind how best to spend it.” I have tried to represent her 
truthfully as she appeared to me ; but I believe that neither the 
best nor the worst of us comes to the surface. Her inner life 
can only be guessed at. In extremity, she repeated no texts, 
she quoted no hymns, she made no audible prayer. She died, 
many will say, as a better kind of heathen might have died. 
But she knew well the great truths of Christianity ; and is it 
to be supposed that, on her long solitary journey, in the multi- 
tude of her thoughts within she had given none to ponder the 
way to a better country? There are human beings to whom 
it is as impossible to utter their deeper thoughts as it is to 
others to keep silence. Which is the higher type, I do not 
say ; but wisdom is justified of all her children. 


BLINDPITS. 


279 


When Dr. Grant descended the stairs, he went to the 
kitchen and drew forth Bell’s version of her mistress’s illness. 

“Ye ken, doctor, if I had been Miss Barclay, I wad have 
sent for Wilson sooner, but she’s do easy putten out. How- 
ever, when the mistress complained o’ the burning in her 
inside, I spoke o’ Wilson, and Miss Barclay first thought no, 
and then she thought yes, and sent Davie to gang as hard as 
he was fit. It was hut a chance, ye ken, and hardly ; for the 
doctor’s aye sitting havering in the public-house as fou’ as a 
piper.” 

“ Burning ? Bell, did you say burning in her inside ? 
Miss Barclay didn’t mention that — singular ! ” 

“ She wad forget maybe.” 

“ And beef-tea was the last thing she had. I had no doubt 
she enjoyed it. You’re a good cook, Bell.” 

“Well, Miss Barclay made it up the stair — I had naething 
to do wi’t ; but she enjoyed it, and was wonderfu’ weel and 
brisk. However, she did na finish it ; that’s it standing on 
the dresser, covered wi’ the plate. I didna fling it out, for ye 
never ken what’s to he asked for again.” 

The doctor lifted the plate from the basin. 

“There’s a good drop there. And it’s just as she left it?” 

“ It’s as she left it far me,” said Bell, tartly. 

“ Well, Bell, I’m going. David’s in the stable, isn’t he ? ” 

« Yes.” 

“ And, Bell, you may as well go up stairs, and see if Miss 
Barclay needs you. I may as well tell you that Miss Boston 
died as I came in.” 

“ Gude keep us ! ” cried Bell, starting up ; “ it’s no possi- 
ble.” 

“ It’s true though, Bell. It’s been sudden, hut she has 
reached a good old age. I question if you or I will see the 
like of it.” 

But Bell had disappeared. The doctor lingered in the 
kitchen a little, and then took his way home ; and he told 
Mary the sad news. 

“It has been sudden,” he said; “and from all I could 


280 


BLINDPITS. 


gather, I wouldn’t like to swear to the cause of her death just 
at present.” 

“ It is not uncommon for old people to die suddenly, is it ? ” 

“ Not at all. I wonder how much she has left, and how she 
has left it ? ” 

“ Don’t you think, John, it is a little unfeeling to speculate 
on that so soon ? ” 

“It would be unfeeling if it made any difference to her, hut 
it can make none, and I am really anxious about it. A few 
thousands would fit in very well just now. I know one or two 
capital investments.” 

Mary sighed, and said nothing. 

Bell marvelled at Miss Barclay’s calmness, for she herself 
gave vent to a melodramatic hurst of grief every now and then, 
sincere enough at the moment no doubt, hut which a business 
remark would chase into a corner, till she had leisure to let it 
out again. David had been despatched for his stepmother, 
who came, and with reverent loving hands did the last offices 
for her old mistress, and then the stillness of death — what 
stillness is like it ? — fell on the house. Miss Barclay sat 
alone ; and Bell and Davie spoke, when they did speak, with 
bated breath ; and the stars, that had been marching bril- 
liantly in their courses all night, faded before the dull light of 
the December morning, never more to be watched by eyes that 
had often beguiled wakeful hours by peering into their glitter- 
ing array. 

Bell stepped about the kitchen putting things to rights, 
which had to be done, she said to David, to excuse herself for 
moving even in the saddened way she did. She lifted the 
plate from the beef-tea basin, and saw it empty. 

“ How do you like beef-tea, Davie ? ” she said. 

“ I never heard tell o’t,” said Davie. 

“ Weel, how did ye like the stuff that was in this bowl ? ” 

“ I never tasted it.” 

“ Do ye mean to say ye didna drink up the thing that was 
stannin’ in the bowl ? ” 

“ I never touched it,” said David, doggedly. 


BLINDPITS. 


281 


“ Then, what’s come o’t ? It beats a’. It couldna be the 
doctor himsel’ ; he but lifted the plate to glowr at it. But to 
think o’ him drinkin’ off a drap left beef-tea ! and yet it could 
be nae ither body — the bowl wasna gaun to empty itsel’. 
After that ony thing ! Eh, how the mistress wad hae laughed 
if she had kent.” 

“ He’s no the gentleman his father is,” said Davie. 

“ Gentleman ! ” said Bell. “ He’s a’ my gentleman ! ” 

And Barbara sat alone. Was she lost in grief? Bemem- 
ber she was judicious. 

Her grief was deep and sincere, but it was not of that kind 
that blackens creation, and turns the food to ashes in the 
mouth. Her letter home will indicate her feelings. 

“ Dear Mother, — I write to announce to you the sudden 
tidings that Miss Boston is no more ; she died this morning at 
a quarter past six. Her death was quite unexpected, as up to 
yesterday afternoon she seemed to be recovering. She suf- 
fered a good deal, but it is all over now ; and although I could 
have liked that she had made some definite statement of her 
views and feelings, I am sure she was not unprepared for the 
great change. And I think she had little desire to live 
longer ; indeed, at her age, life does not appear very desirable. 
Through her great kindness we are now independent ; but 
reaching independence by the death of a dear friend takes 
much from one’s enjoyment till time shall have mellowed 
grief I trust in prosperity we shall not forget that we are 
only stewards. 

“ Bessie wall be greatly struck by this event. I hope she 
wall learn from it the uncertain tenure of all earthly things, 
and the necessity for doing with our might whatever we have 
to do, endeavoring to lay up our treasure in heaven. — I am 
dear mother, your most affectionate daughter, 

“Barbara Barclay. 

“P. S. — There are no arrangements made yet. I shall 
remain till after the funeral.” 


282 


BLINDPITS. 


Barbara despatched her note to the post-office just as Mr. 
Grant called to be shocked by the very unexpected intelli- 
gence.” 

“ Gone ! ” he repeated ; “ she was very unlike death when I 
saw her yesterday ? ” 

“ Yes,” said Barbara ; and she sketched Miss Boston’s 
sudden and violent illness to him. 

u It was a great trial for you, Miss Barclay,” he said ; “ but 
I am thankful that you were here, and that she was not 
alone.” 

“ It is a sad satisfaction to me,” she said ; “ and I’m glad 
Bessie was spared the pain of witnessing the end. She will 
feel it sufficiently as it is, having been so long with Miss 
Boston recently.” 

“Yes, yes; couldn’t you go home, Miss Barclay, and be 
ready to soothe her ? I would be glad to go with you ; but 
just at this moment I can’t afford the time. You could get a 
train in an hour.” 

“ I have just written,” said Barbara, musingly. 

“ Yes, but you would be there before your letter, and tell 
the news more gently.” 

“ I had made up my mind to stay till after the funeral. I 
thought that was due to Miss Boston’s memory ; but if you 
think otherwise, it would certainly suit me to go home to- 
day.” 

“ Miss Boston never regarded forms, and your staying here 
would be a mere form, you would only sit and be miserable.” 

“ When will the funeral be ? Who makes the arrange- 
ments ? ” 

“ Oh, Mr. Wilson, Miss Boston’s lawyer — a very respectable 
man in Eastburgh. I’ll let him know, and he’ll be here to- 
day, he knows all her affairs ; I know nothing of them — people 
think I do — and once or twice she wished to consult me about 
her will, but I declined having anything to do with it. I 
always decline having to do with wills, beyond recommending 
a respectable lawyer. Then, do you think you will leave to- 
day ? ” 


BXTNDPITS. 


283 


“If yon think it would not look disrespectful,” said 
Barbara, hesitatingly. 

“ I’m not one of those people that mind appearances, Miss 
Barclay, and I would like you to he with Bessie.” 

“ You’re mistaken in thinking I would he miserable here, 
Mr. Grant,” she said, not unnaturally supposing that he was 
concerned about her solitary vigils. Bessie, no doubt, would 
be acutely grieved fqr a little while, but what was Miss 
Boston’s death to her compared with what it was to Barbara ? 

“ Yes,” he said; “you and I, Miss Barclay, may be supposed 
to be a little hardened, but Bessie has never known sorrow, 
has never ” — 

“ I have done my best to shelter her.” 

“ I am sure of it, Miss Barclay ; you’ll do it now — you’ll go 
home to-day, it will be better for you both.” 

“ I daresay it will ; I can do no real good here, and I can 
come back before the funeral. I wish to show that mark of 
respect.” 

“Certainly; Miss Boston deserves all # respect; her death 
will make a great blank to me.” 

In the course of an hour and a half Mr. Grant put Miss 
Barclay in the railway carriage, and she whirled off to Iron- 
burgh, while he went home and wrote to Bessie (lie had written 
to her the previous day). He said — 

“ My dear Bessie, — By the time you get this you’ll have 
heard of Miss Boston’s death. When I left your aunt at the 
station to-day, I noticed she looked pale ; perhaps I was selfish 
in despatching her home so hurriedly, but I could not bear 
that you should meet this sorrow alone. I feel it deeply 
myself; she was a friend of mine before you were born. I 
saw her yesterday, and her last words to me were, ‘ Ye have 
my best wishes, come what like.’ She was referring to our 
marriage, Bessie. The words sound now like a blessing on it. 
As I said yesterday, it must be very soon. I shall be detained 
here till after the funeral. Then I must go to England for a 
day or two, but I shall return by Ironburgh — that will be in 
ten days or so. — Always yours most truly, 

“James Grant.” 


CHAPTER XXXVI. 


When Barbara arrived in Ironburgh, her first act was to 
go to a bank, pay in her money, and post a cheque for the 
amount of her debt to her creditor. Feel as she might about 
her old friend’s death, she could not but be thankful at her own 
release from care. When she rang at her door in Berwick 
Street, Bessie started up : “ That’s aunt’s ring,” and she ran 
to meet her. She grasped her hand in her glad excitement, 
and drew her to the parlor. 

“ Gently, Bessie, gently.” 

And Miss Barclay sank into a seat. Bessie made the gas 
flare up, then turned to her aunt. She dropped on her knees 
beside her, and looking up in her face, said, “ What has hap- 
pened ? Has anything happened ? you look so white and 
queer.” 

“ Do I ? ” she said. “ I’m very wearied, and have a racking 
headache. Nothing has happened but what I dare say might 
have been expected. Bessie, my darling, Miss Boston died 
this morning.” 

“ Miss Boston ! 0 aunt ! ” 

“ Is she really gone ? ” said Mrs. Barclay, partly awed. 

“ No wonder, my dear Miss Barclay, that you look ill. I’ll 
get tea immediately — that will revive you,” said Miss Dobbie, 
who was one of those ladies that have unfailing faith in a 
“ cup of tea ” in all circumstances. 

“Aunt, is it really true? 1 thought she was getting 
better,” and Bessie’s tears fell fast. Barbara sat dry-eyed, 
and recounted once more the particulars. 


BLINDPITS. 285 

“Very singular!” said Mrs. Barclay. “What could her 
illness have been ? ” 

“ It was death, mother, at all events, and the cause seems 
of small moment.” 

“Aunt, you look very worn,” said Bessie. 

“I never was in bed last night; and the shock and the 
journey together have done me out.” 

“ There was no hurry for you coming home to-day,” said 
her mother. 

“ Mr. Grant seemed to think I should. I’ll get over the 
fatigue in a little.” 

“ You saw Mr. Grant to-day ? ” said Bessie. 

“ Yes,” said Barbara. 

Bessie couldn’t ask another question about him. 

“We’ll soon be at our wits’ end now,” said grandmamma, 
“ and see whether his attentions to Miss Boston have been 
the pure disinterested acts you think, Bessie, my dear.” 

Neither Bessie nor her aunt answered the remark. Imme- 
diately after tea Barbara went to bed, and ikwas Bessie who 
waited on and soothed her ; and she needed it. As to Bessie, 
Mr. Grant had miscalculated — modestly miscalculated. There 
was a riot of happiness at her heart that no earthly calamity 
short of his own death could altogether disperse — at least so it 
seemed to her — and she was ashamed of it — ashamed that, 
having heard of Miss Boston’s death, she should feel happy in 
the least. She could not help it, however ; there it was, and 
it stayed unbidden. But she could not tell her aunt her 
secret now — not for a time — not at least until Mr. Grant him- 
self came. And later in the evening, when his note came along 
with Barbara’s letter, she blushed for her own ingratitude and 
heartlessness. He expected her to be overwhelmed, and she was 
not. Every now and then, through the dark cloud, the sun of 
her happiness would shine, and she felt wicked. Surely it was 
an innocent sin — a sin Miss Boston herself would have encour- 
aged, for which Mr. Grant would readily have given the crimi- 
nal absolution. 

When she went to her room at night, she look closely at her 
aunt, and going into the kitchen for something, she said — 


286 


BLIKDP1TS. 


“ Katie, aunt is a great deal better now — she is quite like 
herself again, and sleeping quietly. I got a fright when she 
came in, she looked almost ghostly.” 

“ She did that,” said Katie ; “but a night’s rest will make 
her all right.” 

And it did. Miss Barclay had got quite over her fatigue 
next morning, and in two days went back to Blindpits to pay 
the last mark of respect to Miss Boston, and, as Mrs. Barclay 
said, to hear the will read. 

You can’t with certainty predict what even your closest 
friend may do in given circumstances. Some people leave 
directions for their funeral, down even to the number of nails 
in their coffins — that it shall be small and strictly private, or 
that it shall be large and as public as possible. Miss Boston 
left not a direction or a scrap of writing on the subject ; it was 
a style of vanity not in her line. She was sure she would be 
put below the ground in some way. A grand funeral she con- 
sidered vain mockery ; but if they attempt it, she had thought, 
“they’ll mak’ fools o’ themsels, no o’ me.” Kay, she had left, 
neither a paper nor a letter behind of the smallest importance, 
except her will. Except Mr. Grant, no one went to the grave 
with the deceased lady who was not capable of discussing with his 
neighbor the probable terms of this document. Barbara watched 
the company of mourners as long as they were in sight, then sat 
down in the supernatural stillness and wept in silence. Bell 
and David’s mother had watched from their window, with the 
corners of their aprons at their eyes, and a loud sob and sigh 
whenever they stopped speaking, their topics being the virtues 
and foibles of their late mistress. The married woman dwelt 
on her time at Blindpits as if it had been Paradise lost ; and 
even Bell allowed that she might get a worse mistress. As 
the procession went slowly on, it passed an old man working 
on the road, raking the mud to the side. He stopped, leant 
on the top of his implement, and gazed at it. His hair was 
white, his shoulders were bent, and there was a snuffy drop at 
the end of his nose. He wore old corduroy clothes ; the 
jacket was lying at a little distance from him in the hedge, a 
red cotton handkerchief was twisted round his neck, and on 


BLINDPITS. 


287 


his head was an old battered hat. Another man came up and 
stood till the funeral went by. 

“ Wha’s burying’s that, ken ye ? ” asked the old man. 

“ That ? it’s Miss Boston’s o’ Blindpits.” 

“ Ay, ay ; is she awa’ ? ” said the old man. “ Man, hae ye 
your box ? ” 

The other handed his snuff-box. He tapped the lid, as the 
manner is, took a huge pinch between his broad hard finger 
and thumb, which he sniffed up both nostrils, with every 
appearance of satisfaction, then said — 

“ And wha’s gotten a’ the gear, ken ye ? ” 

“ Ah, but I dinna ken that, John; there will be nae little 
o’t, I’m thinkin’. She had a lang time to gather.” 

“ Weel, she’s no young. I kent her mair than fifty years 
syne. It’s a bit gude land Blindpits.” 

“Was ye in this pairt then, John?” 

“Ay, I was grieve at Mossyside when Stewart was the 
farmer. Then I gaed awa’ west for mony a year ; but when 
the gudewife died I cam 1 back to live wi’ my daughter that’s 
married here.” 

“ Your family will be a’ up and away ? ” 

“ Ou ay, a’ up and away lang syne, and some o’ my bairns’ 
bairns too. Here’s the youngest cornin’ wi’ my denner. ‘ 
That’s a fell wifie,” he cried in treble tones, as a little girl 
came forward, with a horn-spoon in one hand and a tin pitcher 
in the other. 

The old man sat down in the shelter of the hedge to his 
meal. This was John Simpson, the hero of Barbara Boston’s 
early romance ; and this was their first meeting since that one 
that should have been below the hawtliorn-tree. But John 
was not given to moral or sentimental reflection. His snuff, 
his dinner, and his smoke occupied him while his little grand- 
daughter asked “If he had seen the coach with the grand 
black feathers ? ” and when his dinner pitcher was empty, 
and the hour done, he went on contentedly scraping the roads 
again. Decent and stolid in youth, he was decent and more 
stolid in age. Curious, is it not, to think of a life being 
wrecked and embittered on account of such a being as this ? 


CHAPTER XXXVII. 


Mr. Grant and his son returned to Blindpits with the 
lawyer, and, with Miss Barclay, made up his audience when 
he read the will. It was in as few words as a legal document 
could he. Barbara, who considered she knew what to expect 
did not show extra interest ; Mr. Grant, with small expecta- 
tions, felt a just curiosity to know how his old friend had 
disposed of her property ; and Dr. Grant waited with a pleased 
pain to hear what amount of funds would be his to invest 
well and wisely. The popular voice had always rated Miss 
Boston’s wealth at a perfectly fabulous figure. It was known 
that at her father’s death she had heired a good many 
thousands ; and when she had Blindpits in her own hands she 
had farmed it to purpose, while latterly she had drawn a good 
rent for it. The process of accumulation and addition had 
gone on for more than fifty years, and the process of subtrac- 
tion had been nil apparently ; consequently, it seemed as clear 
that Miss Boston’s hoards must he immense as that two 
parallel lines will never meet. 

The will was dated five years previously, and was to this 
effect: — Blindpits, house, farm, and plenishing, together with 
£5000, were left to Barbara Barclay ; £5000 to Bessie Bar- 
clay; £2000 to Mrs. Barclay; £5000 to Mr. James Grant; 
£1000 each to the Misses Stark ; £20 per annum while she 
lived to Mrs. Pringle (David’s stepmother) ; £40 to whoever 
should he servant at the time of her death ; the residue, about 
£1500, to the poor of the parish, to be administered bjr the 
Established and Dissenting clergymen equally. Mr. Grant 


BLINDPITS. 


289 


was appointed sole trustee. The whole amount left was little 
more than £21,000 — twice, thrice, or even four times that 
having been freely spoken of as the sum Miss Boston died 
“ worth.” “ What had she done with it ? ” That was her 
secret, known only to her lawyer and to Mr. Grant, it being 
his duty to look into her affairs ; and far be it from me to make 
public through what channels she had been quietly removing 
her capital to where she expected it would bring a higher in- 
terest ; nor do I presume to judge whether she was right or 
wrong in her methods. Motive is of more account in the eyes 
of the Great Auditor. When Barbara heard the date of the 
will, and how she and her family were provided for, she could 
not but feel remorse in thinking how her own small pride had 
separated her from this friend, in whose memory she and hers 
had all the time been living. If she had not stood on her 
own insignificant dignity, how many opportunities she might 
have had of soothing her latter years — all gone beyond 
recall ! 

Mr. Grant was honestly glad of his legacy, for he w r as not a 
rich man, and he could not in reason object to Bessie’s, 
although, at the same time, he would have liked that she had 
come to him penniless. It would have pleased him that she 
should look to him for everything. He was lost in pleasant 
thoughts of the future. It never occurred to him that fault 
could be found in any quarter with the manner in which Miss 
Boston had divided her money. His son was sitting beside 
him, and he had not looked at him ; but when he got outside 
the gate, John said, in tones of suppressed passion — 

“It is a most iniquitous business altogether. M’Vicar 
brought these people about her, and prides himself on it, the 
great ass ! A beautiful mess he has made, as he’ll find before 
lie’s many days older, or I’m mistaken.” 

Mr. Grant turned in rapt surprise. 

“ What do you mean ? ” 

“ I mean that I have a mind to dispute that will — its a ne- 
farious swindle by that woman and her niece.” 

" Stop, John ! you are beside yourself surely ; the will was 
13 


290 


BLINDPITS. 


made five years ago, before Miss Boston had any private com- 
munication with Miss Barclay or her niece.” 

“ It was dated five years hack. But I watched that 
woman’s face, and nobody will convince me she did not know 
its contents thoroughly.” 

“ Perhaps you think I knew its contents too ? ” 

“ No, but you ought to have known them ; delicacy was 
quite out of place in a case of this kind. You ought to have 
looked better after things. To think of these beggars from 
Ironburgh getting £12,000, and not a sixpence left to me ! 
It’s an evident case of swindle.” 

“ You had better go to Wilson about it ; he drew out the 
will and kept it. Ask him if he is in league with Miss Bar- 
clay.” And there was contempt in Mr. Grant’s tones, though 
he was speaking to his own son. 

“Well, that’s possible. Wilson may not be the man you 
take him for.” 

“ And Miss Barclay may not be the woman you take her 
for.” 

“We shall see,” said John; and having come to the place 
where their roads separated, he turned off. Mr. Grant spoke 
and he stopped. 

“John,” said his father, “if I were you I would pocket 
this disappointment quietly ; try to think better of it, talk it 
over with Mary, and don’t make a speech and scandal of the 
affair in the country.” 

“ I suspect it’s out of my power to stop the scandal now ; 
things will take their way.” 

“ I don’t see that at all. Depend upon it, you’ll only 
be laughed at. A man baulked of a legacy he had counted 
on always is.” 

“If I mistake not, people will have something else to do 
than laugh at me.” 

They parted. Mr. Grant walked away, vexed and ashamed, 
— vexed that his son should be so possessed with the love of 
money — ashamed that he was so mean as to betray his passion 
in this way. That he would take any legal steps in the 


BLINDPITS. 


291 


matter he never for a moment supposed. No lawyer would be 
able to detect a weak point on which to found any attempt 
against the validity of the document. He did not doubt that, 
when he calmed down, John would see this as well as himself; 
but the pain of the interview did not wear off speedily. 


CHAPTER XXXVIII. 


And Barbara sat in her own house, independent and rich, 
according to her tastes and habits. She did not go home for 
two days ; and on the second day she went to Ashburn 
Cottage, to visit the Misses Stark and tell them of their 
legacy. She had specially asked Mr. Wilson not to communi- 
cate with them. She liked to be the bearer of good tidings. 

The Misses Stark had not been without some dim expecta- 
tion of a legacy ; but time passed, and not having heard from 
any man of business, they had resigned their hopes in a meek 
and quiet spirit, and they welcomed Barbara with their accus- 
tomed warmth and great flood of words ; but when they had 
heard the news, they did not, of course, betray any demonstra- 
tive unladylike feelings on the occasion, but a glad heart 
showed itself in a springing step, and increased confidential 
geniality. £100 a-year added to their present income, the 
three ladies knew, made all the difference between fendin’ and 
farin’ weel, although none of the three, you will realize, ex- 
pressed herself in that familiar phrase ; and now they would 
be able to travel as befitted papa’s daughters. Papa ! Would 
the jovial young papa, that used to romp with his two curly- 
headed girls, if he were to open the door and walk into Ash- 
burn Cottage, recognize the two gray, peculiar, garrulous, 
elderly women as the daughters he left behind him long ago ? 
I think not ; I don’t think the mother that bore them would. 
The small Ainslies in the nursery at Edenside sometimes 
electrified each other by declaring that once the Misses Stark 
were babies and little girls. Yes ; it was quite true. Yet it 


BLINDPITS. 293 

needed faith to believe it. But there was often an innocent 
look in Barbara Barclay’s face, and a cheerfulness in her sen- 
sible demeanor, through which you could trace her back quite 
readily to childhood and youth. 

This was a memorable evening at the cottage ; the ladies 
talked much of their late friend, and you may be sure they 
said no evil. The Misses Stark looked forward with a sub- 
dued jubilation to Miss Barclay settling at Blindpits — “ she 
would be such an acquisition ; ” and these ladies never parted 
with each other feeling more comfortable than they did on this 
occasion. The loss that had befallen them was not a case of 
hearts that had grown together being rudely torn asunder. 
They had all known the strain of desperate bereavement, and 
this was very different. Except to one or two would the death 
of any of us cause more than a heartache for a day or two ? 
A sigh, and a solemn face, as that day week, that day month, 
that day twelve-month, came round ; then oblivion. Besides, 
Miss Boston’s was no untimely death ; it was in the course of 
nature ; she had gone to the grave full of years. Barbara re- 
turned much less sad than when she set out. There are few 
women, and not many men, to whom a full talk is not a con- 
solation in most circumstances. 

Before she left next morning, Barbara looked through the 
house for the first time with an eye to business, that she might 
see what was needed in the way of repairs and alteration 
before she removed her household, which she meant to do early 
in the coming season. She remembered, with tender regard, 
Miss Boston’s kindness when she had come, on what she felt 
such a painful errand, only a short fortnight ago, how she had 
told her not to mind turning the house inside out to make 
herself comfortable. 

Barbara would have set about judicious reforms whether 
Miss Boston had spoken in that way or not, for she was a 
liberal conservative, and had nothing of an antiquarian spirit, 
but it pleased her to remember that Miss Boston had spoken 
as she did. Before she left she summoned Bell to an inter- 
view, and asked whether she preferred leaving Blindpits 
immediately or remaining till the term. 


294 


BLINDPITS. 


lt Weel,” said Bell, “ I’ll be gey lanely and eerie here in 
the lang nights.” 

“ You would prefer leaving ; very well, I’ll make arrange- 
ments to that effect.” 

“But, Mis3 Barclay, if you wished me to bide” — 

“ No, no ; it doesn’t matter to me.” 

“ What I was gaun to say was, that it wad answer me as 
weel to bide.” 

“ Then stay ; why did you not say so at first ? ” 

“ You’ll be back in a wee, likely ? ” 

“ My plans are indefinite as yet.” 

Bell did not know precisely what “indefinite” meant, and 
she retired bafiled, as she had been two or three times before 
in trying to get information and to make herself of impor- 
tance to the new proprietor. Barbara did not approve of 
Bell — consequently, though she was always kindly towards 
her, she was brief and reticent. That evening, when visited 
by Mr. Bogle (whose visits she counted on to give wings to 
the winter evenings), Bell described the calm, imperturbable 
Barbara as “ a close customer.” 

“ It was easy kennin’ the best and the worst of the old 
mistress, but this was a deep ane.” 

Barbara reached Ironburgh in time for the usual early 
dinner, and found that under grandmamma’s auspices the 
sudden prosperity of the family was already beginning to 
tell prominently on the dinner-table. It would not be true to 
say it was a dismal dinner-party, or that there was a pretence 
of dismalness. Mrs. Barclay had been somewhat awestruck 
at first by the suddenness of the death, but she recovered 
when she heard of the smallness of her inheritance. She 
had no sympathy whatever with John Grant, and considered 
him rightly served ; but for herself she felt neither grief nor 
obligation. She had had time to think now, and she found 
that as she was still to live with Barbara, her money would at 
least keep her pocket, and as particulars would not be 
generally known she would naturally take the place of con 
sequence and importance as head of the family. Miss 


BLINDPITS. 


295 


Dobbie’s spirits bad been in a flutter since sbe knew that sbe 
was to be retained as a member of tbe family, for at tbe first 
blusb of tbe news sbe bad deemed that improbable. But 
Barbara, would not bave bad tbe heart, even if she bad bad 
tbe wish, to set her adrift. Mrs. Barclay, who bad felt pro- 
found mortification that it should be said of tbe mingled race 
of tbe Barclays and Bostons that it bad been reduced to tbe 
awful degradation of keeping boarders, had no objections to 
retain her when sbe would pass for a bumble companion and 
really be useful to herself in that capacity. 

Her customary cheerfulness bad come back to Barbara, and 
Bessie even ventured on a joke or two. Her secret could 
almost bave made her float in air. The afternoon was spent 
in discussing plans for tbe future. Mrs. Barclay proposed 
they should leave Berwick Street immediately, and either take 
lodgings in tbe west end or go to some watering-place having 
a mild climate for the winter. Such bold ideas bad not 
occurred to Barbara, and sbe said, “ I think we would be more 
comfortable here in our own home till Blindpits is ready. I 
daresay, mother, you won’t believe it, but it will give me a 
pang to leave this house.” 

“ Aunt feels like tbe colonist who lias grown rich, and is 
leaving tbe wooden shanty and the rude furniture which were 
made by the sweat of bis brow. I don’t wonder, auntie ; I 
have grown wiser within this little while, and I understand 
better all you have toiled to do — but never fear, we shall bave 
happy times at Blindpits yet.” 

“ If your aunt prefers to remain here, Bessie, I see nothing 
to hinder her, only there’s this — people will be coming about 
on business, and if- they are received here it will be as good as 
telling them that we have been paupers. As we have got 
money, and he is so friendly, possibly Mr. Grant may take it 
into his head to visit us. It would be uncommonly pleasant 
to have him in this closet, where one could hardly pass him 
without tramping on his toes.” 

“ Why, grandmamma, he’s not taller than Mr. Pettigrew, and 
I never tramped on his toes — his literal toes at any rate.” 


2,96 


BLINDPITS. 


“Pauperism is not in itself a thing to be ashamed of, 
mother,” said Barbara. “I trust I shall never have anything 
more to be ashamed of than having been poor.” 

“Then, grandmamma, if men of business came here, they 
would see that aunt is a woman of business and not an igno- 
rant fine lady. As for Mr. Grant, I am sure he would be glad 
to come and see us if we lived in a coal-hole.” And Bessie 
laughed — a laugh of pure happiness. 

“ Well, of course, as I am left without the means of doing 
anything, I must be thankful to fall in with what you think 
best.” 

“ I think, Mr3. Barclay,” said Miss Dobbie, “> that in the 
winter there is no place so comfortable as one’s own house, if 
I may venture to give an opinion.” 

Mrs. Barclay took no notice of the observation, but went on : 
— “ As you don’t seem to know what’s due to yourself, Barbara, 
it’s no wonder you don’t know what’s due to me.” 

“ I only said I would prefer to stay here ; but as you are so 
anxious about it, we can leave ; ” and Barbara looked round, 
almost fondly, on her little sitting-room, where ingenuity had 
often done the work of money, and which she had labored so 
hard to secure as a shelter for her mother in her old age. 

“Very well, Barbara; you’ll find you’ll be more respected 
where jmu are going, if it’s not known how poor you have 
been here. I’ve been longer in the world than you.” 

“ I don’t value such respect.” 

“Why, grandmamma, people are not so simple. I have no 
doubt Heatherburgh knows all about us already, as well as we 
could tell them. There’s Mr. Bichardson next door knows 
everybody yonder, and would tell quite readily that we lived 
here ; it would never occur to him as a thing to be ashamed 
of, or to conceal. Moreover, Mr. Pettigrew visits at Blind- 
pits ; why, Mary Grant told me that it was currently reported 
at one time that we kept a mangle.” 

Mrs. Barclay grew pale and red by turns. 

“Who in the world could have originated such an infamous 
report ? ” she gasped at last. 


BLINDPITS. 


297 


u I don’t know, grandmamma, and I would not have told 
you, only I thought you would laugh as I did ; besides, it is 
quite a respectable business.” 

The blood had flushed up below Miss Barclay’s brown skin, 
and she said, “Yes, Bessie, many worthy people have kept 
mangles ; still how could such a report originate ? ” 

“ Somebody might say it in joke, that would be quite suffi- 
cient.” 

“ Quite enough,” said Miss Dobbie ; “ I remember Miss 
Davie used to say there were persons in whose presence it was 
dangerous to joke.” 

“ I’m very far from looking down on people who keep man- 
gles,” said Miss Barclay, “ but ” 

“ But they are centres of intelligence, auntie. Dionysius’ 
ear was a poor contrivance for gathering news compared with 
keeping a mangle ; if we had followed that profession we 
would have known how every family in the street lived, moved 
and had its being.” 

“ I think the propriety, if not the necessity, of shifting oui 
quarters before we have visitors is pretty well proved at any 
rate,” said Mrs. Barclay. 

“ Very well, mother ; if to-morrow is a favorable day, we 
shall make a tour of inspection; I daresay we’ll find some- 
thing eligible.” 

Then grandmamma grew genial, and they proceeded to plan 
the alterations they were to make at Blindpits. It was more 
than thirty years since Mrs. Barclay had been in the house, 
but she recalled the details with a precision which was remark- 
able. 

Bessie made one or two jokes and Barbara looked grave. 
“Auntie,” she said, “you have something on your mind, or 
you’re thinking of Miss Boston, and supposing that I have 
forgot her, but I haven’t. Are you wondering how you’ll 
manage a country establishment ? Mr. Grant, you know, will 
tell you about everything.” 

“ And perhaps that may lead to something better yet. You 
know what I once proposed ? ” and Miss Dobbie looked wise. 
Bessie laughed. Barbara said — 

13 * 


298 


BLINDPITS. 


“I doubt it. Besides, a man who has lived so long in 
single blessedness is not the most desirable companion ; ho 
has got confirmed in so many hard bachelor habits.” 

“ Mr. Grant has no hard bachelor habits, aunt ; and I think 
the woman that marries him will be the most fortunate woman 
alive.” 

“Bessie, my dear, a child like you shouldn’t speak on such 
a subject in such strong language.” 

“ Girls are different,” said Miss Dobbie, “ from what they 
used to be in our day ; it would not have been thought proper 
for us to speak in that way, Miss Barclay, but the style of 
manners has changed very much.” 

“ I didn’t think I’ve said anything wrong, aunt.” 

“ No, not positively wrong ; but I would say your grounds 
for supposing that if Mr. Grant were to marry — which with 
his confirmed habits is a thing in itself unlikely— his wife 
would be the happiest woman alive, must be very meagre, and 
not such as to justify such an emphatic declaration. I trust 
you will learn to think a little before you speak, my dear.” 

“ I don’t speak without thinking, but it doesn’t matter.” 

“ Bessie can’t measure her words by rule,” said grandmam- 
ma; “she takes that off me, and warm words are better than 
measured ones any day.” 

Tea came in and created a diversion of subject, and shed its 
balmy influence ; and surely it was an innocent and happy 
little tea-party, each individual in her own way looking for- 
ward to something brighter and better — each individual ? 
sometimes there was a shade on Barbara’s brow, but on the 
whole perhaps the gas of Ironburgh did not shine this Janu- 
ary evening on a more tranquil-looking secure household than 
this ; and the hour led on, as they sat thus chatting of the 
small outside affairs of life — led on to what was to be the 
event of time for them. 


CHAPTER XXXIX. 


The servant entered the room, and said there were two 
gentlemen at the door who wanted to see Miss Barclay. 

“ Gentlemen ? did they give their names, Katie ? If you 
are sure they’re gentlemen, bring them in.” 

“ I’m not sure, hut they must see you they say.” 

“ People on business already ? ” said Mrs. Barclay ; “ how 
annoying ! the sooner we leave this the better.” 

“ Ask their names, Katie,” said Miss Barclay. Katie came 
back. 

11 He is Mr. Jackson, he says, a superintendent of police, 
and he must see you.” 

“ Then tell him to come in ; I see nothing else for it. We 
certainly would be the better of another room.” 

“ What can he want with us ? ” said Mrs. Barclay. 

“A domiciliary visit; fancy yourself in Warsaw, grand- 
mamma.” 

Mr. Jackson entered, bearing out Katie’s uncertaintj'' about 
his being a gentleman ; he did not appear very comfortable or 
at his ease. Custom will do much, but even custom will not 
harden a man who thinks, although his business may bring 
him in daily contact with crime. It is true we cannot rise 
from our chairs without brushing on a mystery, but the evil in 
this fair creation is assuredly the mystery of mysteries. 

Mr. Jackson had no mafks of the typical detectiye about 
him ; his face did not indicate the preternatural acuteness 
supposed to belong to the policeman born, not made, nor any- 
thing of the instincts of the pointer in crime. Possibly his 


300 


BLTKDPITS. 


heart could yet beat to the still sad music of humanity, and 
he had a wife and bairns at home. He did not seem to know 
how to introduce his business, and his companion sat looking 
at the floor. Bessie could not help smiling — 

“ What it is to be rich,” she thought, making fun to herself. 
“ Katie must have been throwing some cabbage-leaves over 
the window, and, lo, a solemn deputation waits upon us.” 

“ I have a paper here,” said Mr. Jackson, “ which relates to 
Miss Barbara Barclay ; policemen have no choice of duties, I 
may say. It is a warrant signed by the sheriffs of Heather- 
burgh and Ironburgli for the apprehension of the said Barbara 
Barclay on the charge of compassing the death of the late 
Barbara Boston of Blindpits by poison, etc. You are my 
prisoner, and as soon as convenient you will accompany me to 
the police-office.” 

An almost amused incredulity showed itself on the faces of 
three of his audience. Barbara grew very white, she spoke 
rapidly and as if suppressing excitement. 

“ Did Miss Boston die of poison ? how was it discovered ? 
who could do it ? she hadn’t an enemy ; no one in the house 
had a motive.” 

“ It is safest to say nothing, Miss Barclay,” said Mr. Jack- 
son ; “ at this stage, it is safest to say nothing.” 

“If by that,” she said, rising with some dignity, “you 
mean that I have anything to conceal, I have nothing. I can 
say nothing unsafe.” 

She had only been rapidly thinking of Miss Boston’s ill- 
ness, and now it did seem to her that there was a coloring for 
such a suspicion; but who could do it — herself apart, who 
could do it ? 

“My daughter, Mr. Jackson,” said Mrs. Barclay, drawing 
her shawl majestically round her; “my daughter is im- 
measurably above suspicion — above suspicion ! she is ” — 

“0 Mr. Jackson!” said Miss Dobbie, “you don’t know 
Miss Barclay; these sheriffs don’t know her, or they never 
would have sent you on such an ungentlemanly errand ; I 
have known her— known lier for years.” 


BLINDPITS. 


301 


“ I don’t in the least doubt it ; it will all be put right in 
good time, I hope ; but when Miss Barclay is ready we’ll go.” 

Bessie bad disappeared; she had realised the thing; the 
terrible nature of the position bad dawned on her ; she ran to 
Mr. Dods’ door, pulled the bell, so that it rang again, and 
nearly overturned Mr. Dods as she rushed past him into Mr. 
Bichardson’s room. Graham was quietly eating his dinner, 
and reading a magazine which stood before him, propped by a 
tumbler. A hurried touch made him look up. There was 
Bessie with a face of ghastly pallor, hardly able to speak ; it 
seemed as if a flame had darted up her throat and scorched 
the moisture even from her lips. 

“ Come ! ” she said, “ you know something of law, a strange 
mistake — come ! ” He did not comprehend, but he saw her 
in distress, and in that moment he knew he loved her, he rose, 
put his arm round her, stooped and kissed her passionatel} r . 
It was done on the spur of the moment ; he meant to express 
love and shelter, and he did it in the shortest language, and 
the most ancient and universal, probably. She drew herself 
away, and a kind of shudder ran through her. 

“ Come ! ” she reiterated, and he followed her, vexed at his 
own act; she was no longer to him the little girl he had 
laughed at and with — she was the woman he loved, the divinity 
he almost worshipped ; and had she been a dairymaid, he could 
not have made the first intimation of his feelings more em- 
phatic — no wonder that she was offended. 

“ Bessie,” he said, 11 I’m sorry — I beg your pardon, I ” 

She looked up, her large eyes almost on fire. 

“ 0 Mr. Bichardson,” . she said, “ it is a terrible thing to 
fall on us. See if nothing can be done ; must aunt go with 
these men ? ” 

“ Miss Barclay ? what men ? ” he said. 

As they entered, Miss Barclay was saying — 

“ Mother, I shall be obliged to go with Mr. Jackson to- 
night ; the mistake is very extraordinary, but there is no help 
for it ; I’ll get my bonnet ; ” and she moved to leave the room. 

" If you please,” said the superintendent, “ could one of these 


302 


BLIKDPITS. 


ladies bring it ? it is my duty not to lose sight of my pris 
oner.” 

“Mr. Richardson,” said Mrs. Barclay, “you are come in 
time to save us from indignity and insult.” 

“Glad to see you, sir,” said Mr. Jackson; “you will per- 
haps he able to make these ladies ” — waving his hand towards 
Mrs. Barclay and Miss Dobbie, who were still intent on con- 
vincing him of his monstrous error — “ to make these ladies 
hear reason. 

“ My prisoner,” he thought, “ is evidently a strong-minded 
female ; ” now that he had got the shock of his business oyer, 
Mr. Jackson was studying Barbara professionally. Graham 
read the warrant and stood utterly confounded; when he 
raised his eyes Barbara was looking at him anxiously. 

“ What do you think of that ? ” she said. 

“You’ll have to go, dear Miss Barclay, there is no question 
of that ; but of 'course the charge as against you hasn’t, can- 
not have, the shadow of a foundation. Why, they may as 
well say I did it.” 

“ Bring my bonnet and shawl, please, Miss Bobbie ; you’ll 
get them on the bed in my room.” 

Miss Dobbie was crying by this time ; w'ords had failed 
her ; not even from the deep wallet of Miss Davie’s experience 
could she bring up anything to suit an occasion like the pre- 
sent, which is not matter for surprise. 

“ Aunt,” said Bessie, huskily, “ let me go with you.” 

“ hTo, my dear, you must stay with grandmamma ; take care 
of her, and ” 

She stopped ; she could not say any more without breaking 
down. She looked back from the door and bowed to her 
mother and Miss Dobbie. Graham offered his arm, and lean- 
ing on him, with a policeman in front, and another behind, 
Barbara went down to the cab that was in waiting ; and it 
was thus she left the humble home that for so many years she 
had labored to uphold in honesty and integrity. 

She was no sooner fairly gone than Mrs. Barclay fainted. 
Poor woman! afflicted as she had been, this was surely the 


BLINDPITS. 


303 


crowning trial, and even she felt it to be so, though she had 
always been in the habit of undervaluing Barbara. Attending 
to her grandmother distracted Bessie’s attention, in some 
degree, from thoughts of her aunt, and as she and Miss 
Bobbie were both in Mrs. Barclay’s room, they were 
ignorant till after that the other apartments of the house 
had been searched by the police, who politely refrained from 
intruding on them, as they got all they were in search of 
without doing so. Katie, who attended them, said all they 
took was Miss Barclay’s leather travelling-bag, and some 
letters off the mantelpiece. Bessie looked to see what letters 
were gone, and found that those which Barbara wrote from 
Blindpits to her mother were away ; they had been stuck 
behind a vase with other unimportant missives, and thought 
no more of. What could be wanted with them ? what could 
they possibly be evidence of ? and as she tried to recall them, 
word by word, they seemed to her only to prove her aunt’s 
goodness ; not that a doubt of Miss Barclay’s innocence ever 
crossed her mind for an instant ; her grief was the horror of 
her name being put in such a connection — the present con- 
tumely, the publicity which would cause her aunt such acute 
mental suffering ; but for fear of what the end would be she 
had none. She knew nothing of the circumstances, but she 
knew that her aunt was innocent. 


CHAPTER XL. 


Pretty far on in the evening Graham came back. Mrs. 
Barclay had fallen into a kind of troubled sleep, and Miss 
Bobbie sat by her. Bessie had returned to the parlor, where 
she had cried and sobbed as if her heart would break, till at 
last she gathered herself up, feeling she was behaving like a 
child, and when Graham entered she was sitting calmly gazing 
into the fire. He had expected to find her in childish dismay, 
and was taken aback by her self-possession. 

“Where have you left aunt?” she asked. 

“ I left her in a good enough room at the police-office ; she 
will be there all night ” 

“ And to-morrow ? ” 

“ I don’t exactly know what wdll be to-morrow ? ” 

“ The mistake will be cleared up, and she will come back, 
will she not ? ” 

“ The mistake will be cleared up sooner or later, I don’t 
doubt.” 

“ I interrupted you rather rudely at dinner. I was so as- 
tounded at the first. We are greatly obliged to you for your 
kindness.” 

Graham stood the picture of mortification. Miss Barclay’s 
arrest he considered only a most unfortunate thing — serious no 
doubt, but not so serious as to banish from his mind, or from 
his tongue, his own closer affairs. He had come back, as I 
have said, expecting to find Bessie in childish dismay. He 
was to talk everything over with her; he was to gather her in 
his arms and comfort her; the present grief was to draw them 


BLINDPITS. 


305 


closer, and he was to be everything to her. Instead of this, 
she was cool and self-possessed, and held him at arm’s length 
— even in this emergency. Could it be that the wound he 
had given her pride was rankling, and that she had not for- 
given the rash liberty he had taken ? ” 

But Bessie was not thinking of that ; she had determined, 
for her aunt’s sake, to act so that she might not be supposed 
to have the slightest misgiving as to the issue. For Graham, 
■when she thought of him, she liked him as she always had 
done, but in the meantime her mind was so filled with other 
absorbing subjects, that she had really forgotten what he sup- 
posed had offended her so deeply. Had he known this, would 
it have comforted him ? Somehow anything he had intended 
to say died on his lips, and he felt he had better go aw ay, 
only she was so lonely ; he knew the two other ladies well 
enough to be aware she would get no support from them. 

“ You are lonely,” he said by impulse, and unconsciously his 
voice softened. 

“ No, not with grandmamma and Miss Dobbie. I expect 
Mr. Grant possibly to-morrow.” 

u I’m glad of that, I’m heartily glad of that,” said he ; “ he 
will know how to do and what to do. I am so ignorant my- 
self, I thought of going for him.” 

u We are greatly obliged to you, Mr. Bichardson.” 

He was stung into saying — “ Don’t say that again, Bessie, 
in that tone. You know I would do anything in the world to 
help you, and I don’t deserve that you speak to me in that 
way.” 

“ I daresay I wasn’t thinking what I was saying. Aunt 
will thank you better another time.” 

He was just going to burst into an impassioned speech, 
when Miss Dobbie, on tiptoe, entered the room. She bowed 
to him, and said to Bessie in a loud whisper — 

" Grandmamma is still asleep.” 

Graham wrung the hands of both ladies, and went away. 

“ I have arranged three chairs,” she whispered, “ in grand- 
mamma’s room j I’ll sleep on them, and be ready if she needs 
me.” 


306 


BLINDPITS. 


Bessie didn’t oppose her, and when she went into her aunt’s 
empty room all her dignity fled. It seemed as if years had 
passed since tea-time, such a gulf of misery had opened in 
these few hours. She cried and sobbed again till she slept 
from weariness and sorrow. 

When Graham went into his room, the magazine he had 
been reading was lying open on the table, hut he pushed it 
away ; the real events of life had swamped the incidents of 
the serial tale. He stood with his hack to the fire ; and when 
he thought of the good, proper, judicious Miss Barclay, in her 
present position, it struck him for the moment as being so 
ludicrous, that he actually laughed. Just then Mr. Dods 
looked in. 

“ It’s no true, then ? ” he said ; “ I thought it couldna he 
true, hut what will folk no say, especially women, for a wee 
while’s excitement ? ” 

Here Mrs. Dods followed her husband. 

“ He’ll no believe,” she said, referring to Mr. Dods, “ but 
Katie telled me that the house was searched after Miss Bar- 
clay was ta’en away, and the police took a wheen letters and a 
hag wi’ them. Wha could raise sic a story on her, and what 
evidence can they hae ? ” 

“ That’s what I don’t know, and what I would like to know,” 
said Graham ; “ it is to me the most inexplicable thing I ever 
heard.” 

“ It’s outrageous,” said Mr. Dods, “ perfectly outrageous, 
Eh, I’m vexed ! ” 

“ Vexed!” said Mrs. Dods, “I have done nae thing hut 
shake since I heard o’t. Think on sic a weel-living person 
lifted out o’ her house on a charge o’ that kind ! it cows a’.” 

“ It’ll kill her,” said Mr. Dods ; “ an’ what’ll come o’ Bessie, 
puir thing ? I wonder you could laugh at onything the night, 
Mr. Bichardson.” 

“ I wonder that too, hut I could not help it. It’s had 
enough ; but any one who knows Miss Barclay can have no 
doubt that it will all come right.” 

“ The wonder is how in the world it cam’ to this. I ken 


BLINDPITS. 


307 


she keepit arsenic, and has done for many a day. I whiles 
tell’t her it wasna chancey. What’ll he done the morn ? ” 

“ She’ll he examined,” said Mr. Dods, “ and witnesses will 
be examined ; an’ if there’s grounds for it, she’ll be committed 
for trial, and if not, she’ll he set at liberty.” 

“She’ll he set at liberty!” echoed Mrs. Dods. “Weel, 
we’re jist keeping you out o’ your bed, Mr. Richardson. I 
canna tak’ it in — I really canna tak’ it in.” 

And, with distress and concern in their faces, the pair with- 
drew. Left to himself, Graham still thought of what he con- 
sidered the singularly unfortunate business ; for, granting she 
was set at liberty to-morrow, it would still remain a life-long 
misfortune — at least she herself would feel it so. And Bessie 
— this was a different style of publicity from what she had 
aimed at. At that moment he would have given anything to 
have made a hole in the thin wall, to see what she was doing. 
That being impossible, he sat by the fire, and puzzled himself 
trying to conjecture what combination of circumstances could 
have brought Miss Barclay into a position like this. He was 
rising to go to bed when his eye fell on a letter lying on the 
mantelpiece ; he took it up, and seeing J ohn Grant’s writing, 
opened it eagerly to see if he knew anything of the matter : — 

“ Dear Graham — I’m vexed for your romantic sensibilities. 
People in this district are enjoying or enduring a strong sen- 
sation at present, at the expense of certain protegees of yours. 
You should see MYicar. If ever I saw a man sing small, it’s 
him at this moment. It has been discovered that the poor old 
woman at Blindpits was dismissed this life a little before her 
time. I took some credit to myself for putting the police on 
the scent. The manner of the death struck me as remarkable 
and not just accounted for by ordinary causes ; so in a quiet 
way I bottled some soup, the last food Miss Boston had taken, 
and despatched it to an analytical chemist. At that time my 
suspicion was but a shadow ; but when I heard the terms of 
the will it grew to a certainty — the motive was supplied. My 
chemist found arsenic in the soup — information was forwarded 


308 


BLINDPITS. 


to the police. A post-mortem examination was ordered, and 
lias been gone into to-day by medical men from Eastburgb. 
They have found that death did not result from natural 
causes ; further analysis will tell what it did result from. By 
this time, probably, the woman Barclay is arrested and her 
house searched ; the object of the search being a bag she had 
with her at Blindpits, and which is known to have had in it a 
paper of 'arsenic. She may have destroyed this evidence, or, 
with the short-sightedness proverbial among criminals, she 
may not, but it can be proved to have been in her possession. 
In spite of all this, Mary doesn’t believe it, for no other reason 
but that she doesn’t. I called at the Miss Starks’, too, 
and put these doves in a frightful flutter, by revealing the 
terrible hawk they had made free of their cot ; but before I 
left they actually recovered their breath sufficiently to tell 
me they didn’t believe it either. Bespectable women live in 
nutshells, and have no idea of the wickedness in the world. 
My father is not at home ; the woman and her niece imposed 
on him as well as on most other people. They say it is true 
enough that Tom Ainslie wanted to marry the girl. The first 
blush of this affair will be enough to cure him or any other 
person of that. One thing more : — I would feel a deal of sat- 
isfaction if the old lady herself could know — she deserves to 
know it. All this will be in the papers immediately, and the 
country will have the pleasure of a cause celebre . — In haste, 
yours truly, “ J oiin Grant.” 

Graham devoured this with his eyes, and how he felt it 
would be difficult to say. He wrote to Dr. Grant : — 

“Dear John — I don’t answer your letter. If I didn’t think 
it a libel on both your head and heart I would disown you. 
Give my warmest love and reverence to Mary and the Miss 
Starks. Before I believe Miss Barclay guilty, I shall doubt 
the existence of a Great First Cause. — Yours, 

“ Graham Richardson.” 

And having written thus, he walked through his room, try 
ing to work off the miserable pain the letter had caused him. 


BLINDPITS. 


309 


No doubt the bag had been found, not owing to criminal 
short-sightedness, but to the simplicity of innoceuce. Could 
it be that poison was in it? For what possible reason did 
Miss Barclay carry it about with her ? That she had arsenic, 
Mrs. Dods had said. As for John Grant, he wrote like a 
civilized savage ; to say that it would give him satisfaction if 
Miss Boston could know was a reach beyond a savage. Poor 
Mary ! she deserved a better fate. The case looked serious — 
far more serious than he had allowed himself to believe ; he 
felt keen remorse for ever having seen it in a ludicrous light. 
Miss Barclay had borne up well till he was just leaving her, 
when she seized his hand and said, “ Oh, Mr. Richardson, why 
should I be subjected to this ? n 

And crushing his hand, she dropped it, and turned away 
her face. How was time passing with her ? It needs must 
pass, but for a while she was not conscious of it; her head 
swam, and everything w r as confusion. When she did grow 
capable of thinking, her impulse was to rise and go home ; 
and when she realized that she was here in this place, watched 
and guarded, a mute helpless anguish took possession of her. 
That, however, with Miss Barclay, could not continue long ; 
her want of the imaginative faculty stood her in stead ; if it 
had never hitherto borne her on high, so now it did not pitch 
her from crag to crag to a deeper misery. 

She gradually came to look her position in the face : it was 
not the first time an innocent person had been accused of 
crime, and she remembered perfectly that she had arsenic in 
her desk, but she could explain that satisfactorily. It did not 
occur to her that her explanation might be doubted, which 
was a stretch of simplicity almost beyond innocence, and, if 
she were guilty, was what Dr. Grant would have called a 
piece of short-sighted fatuity. Be that as it may, this view 
of the case calmed her, and it was only when she thought of 
her father, the one protector she had ever known, or when she 
pitied herself as a mother pities a sick weaned child, that 
tears sprang to her eyes. Then she wondered how they were 
passing the night at home — at home ! and silently she 
prayed for them and for herself. 


CHAPTER XLI. 


Miss Dobbie, if she had been less imbued with that charity 
which believes all things, and endures all things, would have 
had a wretched night of it. She had perfect faith in the mis- 
take being cleared up next day, and in every one concerned in 
it making public and profound apologies to Barbara. She 
even imagined a testimonial of some kind being presented to 
her, passing time happily considering what shape it was most 
likely to take, or what would suit her taste best — a piece of 
plate, perhaps, with an inscription, to descend as an heirloom ; 
or a drinking fountain at the end of the street, to be called 
the Barclay fountain. She thought Barbara would prefer that 
to the plate ; but she had not gone to sleep on her three chairs 
when her patient woke up, fully alive to all her load of woe, 
and all night long Miss Dobbie had to bear with the moods of 
the unhappy woman, while in her attempts at consolation she 
was as usual unlucky. 

" Testimonial ! ” cried Mrs. Barclay, when Miss Dobbie had 
been endeavoring to regale her with her own ideas and 
impressions ; “ testimonial ! how is she to prove her inno- 
cence ? she has kept poison in her desk for years ; many a 
time I have told her some mischief would come of it, but no, 
she took her own way. You may push the Lammermuirs 
further in to Lauderdale, but not drive her from her own way.” 

“A cat is an uncomfortable animal in a flat,” said Miss 
Dobbie. 

“ It does not lead to the gallows at any rate.” 

“ 0 Mrs. Barclay, don’t, pray don’t give way to such 
expressions; you’ll frighten me out of my wits.” 


BLINDPITS. 


313 


« It’s not been left for me to do that; where’s Bsssie? tell 
her to come here.” 

“ She’s in bed ; I think she’s sleeping.” 

“ Then let her sleep, let her sleep, poor thing ! Oblivion’s 
the better part of life.” 

“ I wouldn’t say that exactly, Mrs. Barclay.” 

Mrs. Barclay groaned. “If I only knew which hand to 
turn to ; but we’ve been so long buried here, that I know no 
one even to go to for advice.” 

“ Mr. Dods, or Mr. Fraser, or Mr. Graham Bichardson — he’s 
a nice young man,” suggested Miss Dobbie. 

“ But what do they know ? what do any of them know of a 
case of this kind ? I am ignorant even of the names of legal 
firms now-a-days.” 

“ There are the gentlemen in whose chambers Mr. Graham 
is,” suggested Miss Dobbie — “Neal and Frame.” 

“I know as much as to know they don’t undertake crim 

such cases as this. Poor Barbara ! poor Barbara 1 ” and she 
turned her face to the pillow and sobbed bitterly. 

“ I’ve been thinking,” said Miss Dobbie ; “ it’s only my 
own idea — but if you approve, I’ve been thinking would my 
cousin Prank Dobbie’s advice be of any use ? He was bred 
an advocate, you know; he has never practised, however, I 
believe.” 

“Well,” said Mrs. Barclay after a pause, “he might be of 
use — he might tell us what to do at any rate ; being a gentle- 
man of known standing, if he took an interest in the case it 
would do Barbara no harm.” 

Miss Dobbie was delighted to think she had made a sug- 
gestion that was not immediately snuffed out. “ Then I had 
better write ? ” 

“ And we would see or hear of him in the course of a week 
jr so,” said Mrs. Barclay, sarcastically. “That would do 
nicely.” 

“What would do then? if 3 T ou would just say what would 
do ; if I were to go, for instance.” 

“ Yes, you or some one else ; common sense would say 
that.” 


312 


BLINDPITS. 


“ Then I’ll go, I’ll be too happy, the very first thing in the 
morning.” 

And by dawn she dressed, went to a cab-office, turned out a 
carriage and pair, and for a brief space lost herself in the un- 
wonted excitement, and in the illusion that she was once more 
a lady of fortune, with retainers to whom she could say Go, 
and they went, and not the snubbed, subdued being that time 
and change had made her. Mrs. Dobbie and part of her 
family were at breakfast when the reeking horses pulled up at 
the door ; speculation was rife as to who or what was coming, 
and when Miss Dobbie sprang from the vehicle Mrs. Dobbie 
remarked, “ She must he crazy.” 

In a minute more Miss Dobbie was in the room beside them. 
She looked eagerly round and said, “ Where’s my cousin ? 
where’s Drank ? ” 

“ How do you do ? ” said Mrs. Dobbie ; “ this is an early 
visit.” 

“Just excuse all ceremony,” said Miss Dobbie ; “ I want to 
see Drank on most important business^ and I have not a 
minute to stay.” 

“I’m sorry, Jane, that Mr. Dobbie is not at home,” said 
Mrs. Dobbie, to stop the Dranking, which she did not approve 
of, coming from such a source. 

“ Drank not at home ? where is he ? ” 

“Well, Jane, if you must know, he’s in London.” 

“ London ! most unfortunate ! I would have given anything 
to see him for a few minutes ; hut time is precious, you won’t 
take it amiss my running off at once ; you see we must get 
other advice. Good morning.” 

“ Goodness, J ane, what do you want advice about ? won’t 
you eat something? sit down.” 

“ I couldn’t eat, hut I haven’t time. It’s about a ridiculous 
mistake. Good-bye all.” And she ran out as quickly as she 
had run in. 

“ Certainly she is crazed,” said Mrs. Dobbie. 

The young people laughed, not ill-naturedly, hut as most 
young people will laugh at people they consider oddities. The 


BLINDPITS. 


313 


eldest of the young ladies began dipping into the newspapers, 
and suddenly said, “ What is the name of the people Miss 
Dobbie lives with ? ” 

“ I don’t know,” said her mamma ; “ why do you ask ? 
Bella,” she said to a little girl that ran into the room, “ what 
was the name of the person that was here last summer with 
Miss Dobbie ? ” 

“ Mrs. Barclay.” 

“ Are you sure that it was not Miss Barclay ? ” asked her 
sister. 

“ No ; it was Mrs. Barclay ; but there is a Miss Barclay 
too ; Miss Dobbie used to get letters from her.” 

“ And they live in Berwick Street ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“ Then I think there can be no mistake, and Miss Dobbie’s 
visit is accounted for ; hear this. 1 Suspected case of poison- 
ing. — Last night Miss Barbara Barclay, a lady of high re- 
spectability residing in Berwick Street, was arrested on sus- 
picion of being concerned in the death by poison of an aged 
relative whom she was lately visiting. The grounds of sus- 
picion are strong, but in the meantime it would be premature 
to speculate on the issue. We can only express a hope that 
the innocence of the accused lady may be proved.’ ” 

“ That’s a shocking affair,” said Mrs. Dobbie ; “ if Miss 
Dobbie came here about that, she must be more crazed than 
crazy.” 

u How, mamma ? I am sure papa would have given advice 
if he could. Think, if Miss Barclay is innocent, what a 
frightful position it is ; how can three women know how to 
act?” 

“ If she’s innocent it will appear, and if she’s guilty she’s 
quite fit to brazen it out. You and I need never try to meas- 
ure the feelings of such people by our own.” 

“ I suppose not indeed, mamma ; but I wish papa had bee'n 
at home.” 

“ I’m very glad he’s not ; although he would have thought 
twice, surely, before he walked into the newspapers arm-and- 
14 


314 


BLINDPITS. 


arm with a murder case. Miss Dobbie should go somewhere 
else immediately, if there’s any risk of her name being mixed 
up with it ; it’s too shocking. Colonel and Mrs. Leadbetter 
must have been prodigiously deceived when they recommended 
these people so highly.” 

“ Why, you know, mamma, Miss Barclay is their children’s 
governess.” 

<c And a pretty pickle they’ll be in ; governesses are a 
troublesome race, but this caps everything L ever heard of. 
The colonel will have to appear as a witness, I don’t doubt, 
perhaps even his wife.” 

“ 0 mamma, think of the poor creature if she is innocent, 
and if she’s guilty she is still more to be pitied.” 

"Well, my dear, we’ll just have to wait and hear what 
comes out.” 


CHAPTER XLII. 


That day Dr. Grant was passing tlie garden at Edenside, 
and he thought he would look in and see how the Ainslies 
were taking the news, especially as the late Mrs. Gascoigne 
was there he knew. He had Graham’s note in his pocket, and 
was thinking that you might bray a fool in a mortar with a 
pestle without taking the folly out of him. It was romantic 
folly for which he gave Graham credit, otherwise he knew he 
w T as by no means a fool. When he went in, Mrs. Ainslie (nee 
M’Vicar) was sitting at a table alone in the drawing-room 
writing letters. She wrote a great many letters, and she wrote 
good letters. I don’t mean that they were creative, or sugges- 
tive, or even reflective beyond u how time does go,” hut they 
■were fluent and newsy, and the news were never flatly told ; 
in fact, they were-just her talk written. 

This accomplishment of hers impressed her sister-in-law 
mightily. Mrs. Samuel’s education had been of the shortest 
and simplest, and her own tastes had never led her to supple- 
ment it in any degree, so that it was a rule with her, “ Thou 
slialt not write,” only to he broken in extreme cases of 
necessity or mercy. She was a good kindly woman, hut her 
tone of thinking was not lofty, and when she encountered 
mortification of any sort, she bore hack on her money, and 
took heart to face the world as Fitz James faced Black 
Roderick, when “ his hack against a rock he bore.” 

“ If you are in a hurry with your letters, don’t stop for me, 
Aunt Ainslie,” said the doctor. 

“ I’m just done,” she said. “ Well, is there anything new 
about this extraordinary business ? ” 


316 


BLINDPITS. 


“ You’ve heard of it then ? 99 

“ Heard of it ! I should think so. Mr. Ainslie came in full 
of it last night.” 

“ What’s Tom saying to it ? ” 

“ Nothing ; he says nothing. I think he’s fairly frightened ; 
he does not relish the idea of getting a pill.” 

“ I don’t wonder, I wouldn’t relish it myself ; hut people 
persist in believing the woman innocent. I’ve a note from 
Graham Richardson in my pocket, the most Quixotic thing 
you ever saw.” 

“ He doesn’t believe it ? ” 

“No.” 

“ Neither do I ; I believe I did it as much as Miss Bar- 
clay.” 

“ And why ? I didn’t think you were as much imposed upon 
by her as other people.” 

“ I hadn’t much to do with her, but I could see she had 
common sense ; and was any one with common sense going to 
risk her life by poisoning a very old woman, already lying on 
what might very well be her death-bed ? 99 

The doctor was slightly staggered ; it was an argument that 
would have weighed with himself, he felt, if' he had been con- 
templating that line of business. 

“ But people who commit murder haven’t common sense,” 
said he. 

“ Quite so, therefore I say Miss Barclay didn’t do it.” 

“I mean they lose sight of everything but the end they 
have in view, and crime has cropped out in as strange quarters 
before now, Mrs. Ainslie.” 

“ But she needn’t have used poison ; if she had opened a 
little bit of the window near the head of Miss Boston’s bed, 
and left the door ajar, the thing would have been done and no 
risk.” 

“ Every one is not so clever as you, aunt.” 

“ But Miss Barclay is, and she has her cleverness quite at 
her bidding.” 

“ Yes ; she’s cool. She was as cool as a cucumber all 
through.” 


BLINPPJTS. 


317 


“Besides, a person in her position could have no sudden 
pressing demand for money.” 

“ Could she not ? That remains to be seen ; people’s lives 
are not all as they appear on the surface.” 

“ I’ve met with questionable characters in my time, John, 
and if Miss Barclay is one of them it would astonish me. 
She might be ill off for a few pounds, perhaps, but Miss Bos- 
ton would have given her that quite readily I do believe, or 
Bessie — Bessie could have made her do anything. When do 
you expect your father, John ? ” 

“ I don’t know exactly.” 

“ I’m sorry for him ; I’m very sorry for him,” she said, with 
considerably more feeling than ever Mr. Grant had given her 
credit for ; “ although, of course, like me, he won’t believe it. 
Depend upon it, if Miss Boston has been poisoned it has been 
by accident.” 

“ Accident ! how in the world could it happen by acci- 
dent?” 

“ I don’t know ; but it’s a much more rational idea than that 
Miss Barclay did it.” 

Mr. Grant had been travelling all night, and now the train 
he was in was approaching Ironburgh. Ironburgh newspapers 
of that morning had been hawked at every station for some 
rime, but he had not taken one; there was nothing public 
stirring in which he was particularly interested ; besides, by 
the time a man is forty he has his own newspaper and does 
not care for interlopers. He was alone, and slept occasion- 
alty, and when he awoke pleasant thoughts awaited him of the 
welcome he would get when he reached Ironburgh. Only 
pleasant thoughts clustered themselves round Bessie Barclay ; 
very soon she would be at Grantsburn, not to leavd him again, 
his own — why, it was only the beginning of last summer he 
had seen her for the first time, and yet she had blended her- 
self with his very life. What to him was her youth, since his 
age was nothing to her? It did occur to him, however, that 
probably he was the better judge of the situation, but when 
he had gained her she was a penniless orphan. How she 


318 


BLINDPITS. 


was independent, should he represent that to her ? and he 
smiled, thinking how very safely he might do so. Did he 
think with the same complacency of having despatched her out 
of his house when Tom Ainslie made such frequent calls ? or 
of that beneficent deed of his, in presenting Graham with 
money for a Continental tour at a certain crisis ? I hinted 
at the beginning that there was a wily streak in Mr. Grant’s 
nature, and he knew it and loathed it in his higher moods, and 
sometimes believed he had eliminated it, till temptation came ; 
and then — why then, like other people to whom it is given to 
see themselves, he could have seated himself in ashes, and 
called for a potsherd to scrape himself withal. Not that 7 a 
milder cure did not sometimes occur to him, as in thinking of 
the moves I have mentioned, he told himself that all strata- 
gems were fair in love and war. He pictured his meeting with 
Bessie ; he recalled his first meeting with her — his mistaking 
her for- a child, and her offended dignity — his watching her as 
a curiosity, a new and pretty thing — his attention being riv- 
etted by her quaint speech and wisdom — his nature being 
stirred by the soul that lit up the big dark eyes — her simple 
unconscious talk, the comparative cessation of it when it had 
become daily music to his ears — her drawing off — his efforts 
to conquer his folly, as he called it then — his discovery of hex 
on the seagirt rock, and the evening in Miss Boston’s fossil 
drawing-room; — he recalled all these, and bleak as the Janu- 
ary morning was, it seemed as if a summer sun shone for him. 
An urchin on whom a corner of Ironburgh’s mantle of enter- 
prise had fallen, thrust a newspaper in at the carriage-window. 
It lay on the cushion of the seat opposite him, he was not curi- 
ous to look at it ; it lay on the crimson velvet like an evil 
spirit biding its time — like the serpent among the flowers 
watching for Eve’s ear. If it had been a malicious spirit one 
could imagine it absolutely giggling outright as it watched 
the face and form opposite it — a face in which the bronzed 
fresh hues of the country were blended with the active and 
keen intelligence of city life, on which there shone a sense of 
serene happiness ; an erect athletic form, which coming mid- 


BLINDPITS. 


319 


die age had not yet enveloped in a layer of adipose matter 
(by that I mean merely to say that Mr. Grant was not getting 
stout, as gentlemen at his years are apt to do). At last, 
mechanically, he took up the paper ; he was just about laying 
it down again after looking over it, when his eye caught sight 
of the paragraph entitled — 

11 Suspected poisoning case ; 99 and he read it. 4 

He brushed his hand across his eyes, for the type seemed to 
dance before them, and read it again. His face grew of the 
same ashy hue that it did on the morning he found Bessie 
imprisoned among the waves ; he felt faint and leant hack on 
the cushion ; when he recovered a little he read the paragraph 
again. However incredible, the words were there, and again 
a sickness came over him, and for some moments he was 
hardly conscious. 

Had his good old friend really died from poison, and if that 
were possible how did she get it ? 

He recalled his son’s words at parting, wdiich had sounded 
unmeaning at the time, but now they carried double weight. 

“ Miss Barclay is innocent,” he said to himself, “ but the^ 
must think they have strong grounds for the arrest. I must 
move heaven and earth to prove her innocence.” 


CHAPTER XLIII. 


When the train stopped, Mr. Grant drove straight to Ber- 
wick Street. Going np the stairs, he met Graham ; the two 
men shook hands silently, and Graham ascended again with 
Mr. Grant. When they were shut in his sitting-room, Gra- 
ham said — 

“ You have seen the newspapers this morning ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“ Ho you know anything more ? I had a letter from J ohn 
yesterday,” and he handed it to Mr. Grant, who read it, and 
laid it down without speaking. 

“ I thought Miss Barclay innocent last night,” said Graham, 
“and I still think it, hut how is it to he accounted for? It 
seems certain Miss Boston died from poison — we need not 
mention suicide — how could it be an accident ? and besides 
Miss Barclay there were two servants in the house, who, so far 
as my judgment goes, are not likely to have done it. I slept 
none last night, never attempted it, after that letter.” 

“ It’s a dark business — a very dark business ; but Miss 
Barclay is innocent, I could stake my life on that,” said Mr. 
Grant, and again the ashy shade gathered on his face. 

“ I think I could almost do that too,” said Graham ; “ but 
it is a baffling mystery in the meantime.” 

“ Where is Miss Barclay now ? ” 

“ I left her at the police-office last night. I was on my way 
there to see what was to be done, when I met you. I was 
glad to see you, I can tell you.” 

“How does she stand it ? ” 


BLINDPITS. 


321 


“ Better than I could have expected ; it is so extraordinary 
and unprecedented, you know ; really I hardly believe it yet.” 

“ And Bessie — how is she ? ” 

“ At first she was terribly scared. * I was sitting here at 
dinner; and when I looked round, she was standing at my 
elbow like a ghost. She had come for me in the emergency. 
I couldn’t think what had happened, and I — I — hut it doesn’t 
matter. When I came back from the police-office I went in, 
and she had more than recovered herself; she told me you 
were coming.” 

“ This is where they live, isn’t it ? ” 

“ Yes, next door.” 

“ Then we’ll go.” 

When they went into Mrs Barclay’s little parlor, Bessie 
was standing speaking to a little, bald, fresh-faced, fat man, 
and she explained, “Tins is our friend Mr. Fraser, come to 

see if he can be of any use. It is kind — it is ” and she 

stopped just as a quiver came into her voice. 

“ 1 dinna mean in the way of advice, gentlemen,” said Mr. 
Fraser; “I’m no capable o’ that; but if siller is needed for 
bail, or to help otherwise, I’m ready and willin’ ; the wife and 
me just agreed this mornin’ that a mair deserving woman 
than Miss Barclay doesna breathe ; the pains she has ta’en to 
teach the lassies is by ordinar’.” 

The mention of her aunt’s long-suffering patience in the way 
of her vocation nearly overset Bessie. 

“ We are obliged to you, Mr. Fraser,” said Mr. Grant, “and 
if Miss Barclay finds she needs your help, she’ll be glad to 
take it, but I think it is likely she’ll not do that ; but she’ll 
feel your kindness all the same, I’m sure.” 

“ Weel, ye’re just to say the word,” said Mr. Fraser, as he 
went away, — relieved, I may say, that he had driven himself 
up to do what he wanted to do, and at the same time found 
his purse was not to be dipped into. He earnestly wanted to 
help Miss Barclay generously, but the grubbing, money- 
gathering part of his nature had held him back with a grasp 
14 * 


322 


BLLNT>PITS. 


which the nobility in him, backed by his respect and sympa- 
thy for her, had had enough to do to elude. 

Mr. Grant’s first visit to Mrs. Barclay was a strange one. 
There they stood — he, and Bessie, and Graham — and none of 
them seemed to know what to say. While she had been 
engaged with Mr. Eraser, Graham had gazed at Bessie ; then 
he went to the window and looked out, and he saw people on 
the opposite pavement, standing about in groups, pointing to 
the house and speaking together. 

“ What can it he ? ” he thought ; “ can any of the chim- 
neys he on fire ? ” When he turned round Bessie was saying 
hurriedly — 

11 Grandmamma is in bed, not that she’s sleeping, for she 
gets up every little while and walks through the room ; and 
Miss Dobbie has gone to a cousin’s ; she was away before I 
knew. Katie has put down the breakfast as usual, but I for- 
got it. Have you — perhaps you haven’t had breakfast ? ” 

“ No, I shall be very glad of it ; I have been travelling all 
night.*” Bessie went to the kitchen to give her orders. 

“ Do you smell soot ? ” said Graham ; “ people are standing 
looking as if a chimney were burning.” 

“ Have you had breakfast ? ” said Mr. Grant to Graham. 

« Yes.” 

“ Then would you go and try if you can see Miss Barclay ? 
Tell her I am here; I will do all I can for_her ; I’ll follow 
you in a quarter of an hour.” 

“ Certainly ; what can the people be staring at ? ” 

11 Hush ! they are looking at this house because Miss Bar 
clay lived in it.” 

Graham’s face reddened. “I never thought of that. If 
Bessie were to go to the window she w r ould be a gazing-stock. 
Strange that people should ' have so little feeling. I’ll speak 
to the police about it.” 

In going out he met Bessie. “ Good-bye,” he said, “ good- 
bye just now; we have got the right help when Mr. Grant is 
here.” He pressed her hand and kissed it warmly, and was 
gone. 


BLIXDPITS. 


323 


Bessie was hardly aware of it ; she went quickly hack to 
Mr. Grant. “ You don’t look well ; here’s the cup of tea 
Miss Dobbie thinks food, drink, and medicine in one,” and 
she tried to smile as she handed it. “ 0 Mr. Grant ! ” she 
burst out, “ you’ll put all this right at once, and aunt will get 
back to us to-day, will she not ? ” and the great dark eyes 
searched his face for his answer. 

u Ihn not too sanguine, but it will come right in time.” 
He spoke quietly, with a view of allaying her excitement and 
familiarising her mind with the position, as if it were not 
such an extraordinary one after all. 

“ In time ! ” she repeated ; “ how can you be so cool ? oh ! 
I have counted on you — I’ve so counted on you all through 
the night. I have no creature to lean upon but you ; you’ll 
not fail us — you’ll not be ashamed of us ? ” 

Mr. Grant rose ; to sit and eat and drink longer was an im- 
possibility. 

“ Bessie,” he said, “ could you doubthne ? Could you doubt 
me for a moment ? ” 

“Hot all last night. But this morning, when I went to 
grandmamma, she said Miss Dobbie was away to her cousin 
for advice ; and I said I expected you — you would do every- 
thing. She said I was a poor simpleton, and that you would 
take care to steer clear of the case if you could, — that that 
was the way of the world, and that really she wouldn’t blame 
you if you did ; and I had no one to speak to — no one ; and I 
think it will kill aunt. Oh, it will kill aunt ! ” 

“ My darling ! ” lie said, and he drew her closer to him ; 
“your aunt is perfectly innocent, we know. It may take some 
time before we can prove that, however ; but I don’t know 
Miss Barclay if conscious innocence does not bear her through 
this great trial, and bear her well through it. 0 Bessie, all 
this misery endured together will only draw us closer.” 

(( I don’t think I can love j t ou more,” she said humbly. “ I 
have been very wicked. When Miss Boston died, instead of 
feeling the sorrow I ought, and that you expected me to feel, I 
was happy, so happy— I couldn’t help it — thinking qf you; 


324 


BLIXDPITS. 


and now this is my punishment. I am roused from my selfish- 
ness now ; you can’t make me happy now ; only, if I hadn’t 
you, oh ! it would he a deeper, deeper misery.” 

The strong man’s eyes filled with tears. It was her first 
great sorrow, and no ordinary one, and he was not so old hut 
that he could recall the terribly keen edge of youthful grief. 
In after years grief is like a dull, heavy, leaden atmosphere, 
but in early life it is as sudden and fierce as a thunderstorm. 

“ Bessie, it never can be a sin to be happy. You will be as 
happy again as ever, in degree at least if not in kind, and 
when this is over you’ll look back on it as a dream ; but just 
now we must look the circumstances in the face, and try to do 
so calmly and courageously, if your aunt is committed for trial 
— mind I only say if she is.” 

“Will she be ? do you know? and are you only trying to 
prepare me for something horrible ? ” 

“ Ho ; I do not know, but it is possible.” 

* u Then they’ll take bail ; surely they’ll take bail ? ” 

Mr. Grant knew that, in a case of this kind, it was almost 
certain bail would not be taken, but he could not extinguish 
her hopes at once. “ We’ll see ; it will be time enough if she 
is committed.” 

Just then Miss Dobbie entered the room, glowing from a 
sense of being of some importance, and from the unwonted 
excitement of a single-handed and spirited tussle with the 
world. “ Mr. Grant, I presume ? Bessie, you forget to intro- 
duce me, but I know it from Mr. Graham Bichardson ; he is a 
nice young man, Mr. Graham — a particularly nice young man. 
He came out just as I drew up to the door, and settled with 
the cabman for me. It is an awkward thing for a lady to do, 
and one is so liable to be imposed upon. The man was charg- 
ing me a great deal more than the regular fare. I am sure I 
would have given him it with pleasure, if it could have served 
Miss Barclay ; but it is evident it could make no difference in 
her position.” 

Bessie had not the heart to speak ; Mr. Grant bowed. 

“ My cousin Mr. Bobbie, I am sorry to say, is not at home. 


BLINDPITS. 


325 

I didn’t, lose a moment in returning. You will excuse me till 
I tell Mrs. Barclay how I got on.” 

Mr. Grant’s quarter of an hour was gone, and he left the 
house immediately. He had hurried to Ironburgh to arrange 
for his wedding, and instead of that there was thrust into his 
hands, with a suddenness that was confounding, this strangely 
painful and mysterious business. 

Before night Miss Barclay was fully committed for trial on 
the charge of poisoning Miss Boston. She went through that 
day with astonishing calmness ; made a plain statement, from 
which she never swerved, and declared her innocence. She 
burst the bonds of her usually roundabout language, in utter- 
ing some impassioned words to Graham before he left her. 
Mr. Grant she seemed almost to shrink from, and barely 
recognized his presence. When night fell she entered a great 
massive gate ; big polished keys clicked and re-clicked in pon- 
derous locks before and behind her; and on through stone 
passages she went till she came to what was to be her cell. 
She went in and fell on her knees on the bare stones, by the 
side of the narrow bed, and bent her head on it in an agony 
of prayer, a word of which was now and then audible. She 
had that day been driven from one outpost of feeling to 
another, till even to her, with all her life-long notions of pro- 
priety, it was a small matter whether any one was present or 
not. She was for the time unconscious of human presence ; 
and the impression among the warders was that she was act- 
ing, and that she was pretty good at it. 


CHAPTER XLIV. 


Mr. Grant engaged agents for Miss Barclay, and counsel 
was retained of sufficient ability, it was thought, to prove that 
black is white. There was a general stir among the legal 
profession, for it was a very bad and a very interesting case ; 
and the men of the law delight in such a case, as doctors do 
in a horrible complication of disease — delight professionally 
that is. 

And the public took the full use of the sensation ; whether 
they enjoyed it or not depended on their individual tempera- 
ment, for unquestionably there are people to whom such a 
sensation is enjoyment. 

Every circumstance, as it leaked out, was published by the 
newspapers j every morning an additional black stroke cov- 
ered Barbara Barclay’s name. She had taken arsenic with 
her to Blindpits ; she had ample opportunity to administer it ; 
she had the motive, for it was proved from the letter to her 
mother (ending with reflections on the uncertainty of life), 
that she knew the terms of Miss Boston’s will ; more and 
darker, £200 which Miss Boston had received through her 
lawyer only a day or two before the date of Miss Barclay’s 
visit, was missing ; she had hurried from Blindpits on the 
very day of the death, and her first act on arriving at Iron- 
burgh was to pay £200 into a bank, and send a cheque for 
£160 to a creditor who had threatened her with law pro- 
ceedings in case the money was not paid within a given time. 

On the other hand, a letter appeared in one of the Iron- 
burgh newspapers to this effect : — 


BLINDPITS. 


327 


tl Mr. Editor — Sir, as a member (however humble) of the 
community of Ironburgh, and a believer in the axiom fiat 
justitia ruat ccalum , I do not think it essential to apologize 
for trespassing on your invaluable time and space in asking 
for justice. The justice I would crave at the present moment 
is, that the public would not allow themselves to be prejudiced 
against the unfortunate lady who is supposed to be connected 
with a melancholy death in the neighborhood of Heather- 
burgh. My wife and myself have known that lady intimately 
for many years, and we believe she is no more capable of such 
an act than the unborn babe. — I am, 

A Citizen.” 

Mr. Dods sent a copy of this letter to each of the newspa- 
pers, his own name being endorsed by that of his minister, 
but only one editor inserted it. He read it in print with 
much pride and pleasure, and considered he had done some- 
thing for Miss Barclay, and Mrs. Dods declared it was the 
feasiblest thing he had ever written. He laid the paper care- 
fully past beside a provincial weekly that had in its poet’s 
corner the only one of his poems that had ever seen the broad 
light of day. 

u Well, Mr. Dods,” said Pettigrew, K I would have hesi- 
tated before publishing that letter.” 

“ Maybe ye think she’s guilty ? ” said Mr. Dods, with quiet 
contempt. 

u I wish I could see room to doubt it,” said Mr. Pettigrew, 
solemnly. 

“ Peter,” said Mrs. Dods, turning sharply round, “ is lead- 
ing a quiet respectable life for forty year the direct road to 
murder ? Are ye no feared to tak’ your meat frae me.” 

“ But there’s the motive, Mrs. Dods — the motive.” 

“ Motive ! what motive is there to commit murder ? ” 

“ True,” said Peter solemnly. “ My soul, come not into 
their secret; into their assembly, mine honor, be not thou 
united.” 

“ Your honor ” cried Mrs. Dods, warmly ; “ I wadna gie 


328 


BLINDPITS. 


muckle for your honor, or Jacob’s either, for the matter of 
that ” — 

“ Whisht, whisht, gudewife ! Mind J acob was inspired 
when he said that. But for that, looking hack ower his life 
I’ve whiles wondered at his impudence. But he had repented, 
and he was inspired, and that mak’s a’ the difference.” 

“ Weel, I acknowledge I’m wrang. But how in the warld, 
Peter, can ye mak’ up your mind sae soon to think her 
guilty ? Did ye no want to marry her ? You’ll be glad now 
that that hadna happened ? ” 

“ Yes ; but I never was the man to do a thing rashly.” 

“ Except mak’ up your mind that Miss Barclay has com- 
mitted murder. Ye was there the day before the death, Peter. 
Are ye sure ye had nae hand in’t yersel’ ? To my mind it 
was mair likely to he you than Miss Barclay.” 

“ Mrs. Dods, you should take care how you speak, even in 
joke.” 

“ Joke! it’s nae joke. I’m far past jokin’. I wad gie the 
een out o’ my head to prove Miss Barclay’s innocence. 
Wasn’t your cousin Miss Boston’s servant — what does she 
say ? ” 

“ She’s like you ; she’s inclined to think Miss Barclay inno- 
cent.” 

“ I dinna incline to think it — I’m sure of it.” 

“Not that she was a favorite of Bell’s. Still she thinks 
she could not do such a thing.” 

“ She wasna a favorite o’ hers ! Bell wad he jealous, Peter • 
and she’s a by-ordinar woman that can see daylight through 
jealousy. I wad like to ken her. Gudeman, there’s a subject 
for a poem.” 

“ Has she ony evidence to gie — ony evidence that would 
serve Miss Barclay ? ” asked Mr. Dods anxiously. 

“Not a particle for her. She can say that Miss Barclay 
made all the old lady’s food with her own hands ; and I can 
say, as far as the heef-tea is concerned, that Bell never med- 
dled it. I was in the kitchen at the time.” 

“ It heats a’,” said Mrs. Dods. “ I wonder if ye have a 
heart in ye, Peter ? ” 


BLINDPITS. 


329 


“ I couldn’t shut my eyes,” said Peter. “ Bell has been so 
distressed that she could not stay in the house ; and they’ve 
got a carter and his family to live in it, to keep it aired, and 
so on.” 

“ I dinna wonder Bell couldna stay. I wadna like to bide 
there my lane, either ; it’s eerie an thing on a winter nicht to 
be your lane in ony hoose.” 


♦ 


CHAPTER XLY. 


The first night of her imprisonment Barbara slept, or at 
least towards morning she slept, in spite of the strange narrow 
bed and moonlight that shone on the whitened wall opposite 
the short high window, for her mental conflict had been sore 
and she was simply exhausted; hut before she slept, her 
thoughts had gone in a perpetual circle round and round all 
the circumstances of that last day of Miss Boston’s life ; she 
remembered them well, and they started forth in her excite- 
ment with preternatural distinctness. * 

That fatal soup had only been twice out of her own hand, 
the few minutes she left it in the kitchen, and the few minutes 
she left it on the sill of the staircase window. There were 
two people in the kitchen, both at a distance from the fireplace? 
and the doors between her and them being all open, if there 
had been any movement she must have heard it. Instead of 
that, she heard them speaking — Bell from the closet, Mr. 
Pettigrew from his chair by the window — all the time. Then, 
the person who had come in at the front door, gone up the 
stairs, and stopped a minute at least at the window — was it 
possible, was it within the range of possibility, that that per- 
son was guilty ? Do as she might, she was perpetually driven 
up to the conclusion that it was so. She remembered that he 
had made, what struck her at the time as uncalled for, a dis- 
claimer of knowing anything about the will ; she had also 
thought his anxiety about Bessie out of place ; she was hut a 
child, and her acquaintance with Miss Boston of very recent 
date ; hut he had used that as his pretext for hurrying her 


BLINDPITS. 


331 


home, and now it was said that, urged by a guilty conscience, 
she had fled with all speed from the scene of her crime. 

In the tumult of excited thought at midnight, an hypothesis 
will often appear most rational and correct, which will not 
stand the calm contemplation of a new day. But morning 
brought no oth^r light to Barbara ; she could not divest her- 
self of the belief that, if Miss Boston had been poisoned, Mr. 
Grant had done it. But while her feeling amounted to full 
belief, she determined that no breath of suspicion should he 
thrown on any one by her : to accuse another was not to clear 
herself, and she recoiled from the hare possibility of charging 
an innocent person with such a crime. She tried to take her 
thoughts from this, and to fix them on herself and her position 
— to familiarise herself with it, that she might gather courage 
to face it ; then she thought of home, and of those there, and, 
sitting on the corner of her plank bed, she looked up to the 
high window and round on the hare narrow walls where she 
was shut in with solitude — a solitude possessed of an evil 
spirit ; its presence was oppressive and a mockery, for at any 
moment an eye might he on her. 

As she sat there with bent head, losing herself in bewilder- 
ment at the strange thing that had come upon her, she was 
roused by the sound of the key in the lock, and she stood up 
in expectation. The door was flung open, and in an instant 
Bessie’s arms were about her neck, and she cried, “ 0 aunt, 
aunt, aunt this is terrible ! ” and hurst into a fit of sobbing. 
They were left alone for a time, and Miss Barclay said, “ No, 
Bessie, not terrible,” and she drew her down on the edge of 
the bed beside her. “ It would he terrible if I had committed 
the crime they charge me with. How is grandmamma, and 
how have you been at home since I left ? ” 

“I can’t tell — I really can’t tell. We must live you know 
— I suppose people will live through anything — 0 aunt, this 
won’t kill you — say it will not. I wanted to come to you all 
yesterday, hut they said I had better not.” 

“ They were right, Bessie, and though I wanted to see you 
I would rather you had not come. Your life is before you, 


332 


BLINDPITS. 


and bitter things, like bitter words, eat in ; you’ll never forget 
coming here ; I wish you hadn’t come. I’ll tell you what you 
must do : go to some distant place and get lodgings, and let 
Miss Dobbie take them in her name, and you and grand- 
mamma can call yourselves Dobbie too ; that will save you 
from a great deal of unfeeling curiosity. Do that, Bessie, till 

this — this — is over ; and then” Barbara could go no 

further. 

“ Aunt, you can’t think we would do that. Leave you! — 
that would indeed be a bitter thing to mind for a lifetime. 
We are near you in Berwick Street, and I’ll come here as 
often as I can get in ; what do I care for unfeeling curiosity ? 
— and people have been kind to us — all the people that know 
us. Mr. Richardson came with me and Mr. Grant ; they are 
waiting outside. Mr. Grant will spare nothing to help us, 
aunt ; he is indeed a friend in need.” 

Dulled and exhausted as she was, a sudden thrill went 
through Barbara. " Will he ? I would have preferred other 
help. Has no one — have the Leadbetters taken no notice ? ” 

“ Yes ; Colonel Leadbetter wrote to grandmamma, saying 
how sorry he was, and could he be of any use ? I answered 
— I forget what I said : there was no use troubling him when 
we had Mr. Grant.” 

Mr. Grant again ! Barbara covered her face with her 
hands. 

“ Go now, Bessie,” she said. “ Tell grandmamma I’m 
comfortable enough ; the people are indulgent so far as they 
can, and it will soon be over.” 

“ Do you wish to see Mr. Grant or Graham ? ” said Bessie. 

“ I am weary, but I want to see Graham a minute.” 

“ Hot Mr. Grant ? ” 

“ Ho.” 

“ Aunt, he is a good man and true ; trust him. Do you 
feel it dreadful to be left here ? ” 

“ It is dreadful to be suspected of having done anything to 
deserve being here.” 

“ But you have not, aunt ; and nobody thinks so who knows 
anything about it.” 


BLINDPITS. 


333 


“It is time for you to go, Bessie.” The key was in the 
lock. Bessie kissed her again in a rain of tears, and went 
away. When Graham came she grasped his hand and said, 
“ This is good of you — call on them often — he kind to Bessie, 
will you ? I can hardly speak to her, I am so crushed ; and 
when I don’t feel that, I am angry and embittered ; I hope I 
shall be enabled to come to a better frame of mind. Be kind 
to them. I trust you.” She pressed his hand firmly, and 
tears stood in her eyes as she looked at him. 

All the chivalry in him was roused. He bent and kissed 
her hand. “ Thank you ! ” he said, “ for trusting me ; I’ll 
watch over them. Mr. Grant will be more able to help other- 
wise, though.” 

“ God is over all,” she said, and turned from him hastily. 

As he went out, Graham thought he had never seen Miss 
Barclay to such advantage. Somehow the thought of her in 
his mind was always connected with a little bushy dark- 
colored flower, carefully tied up to a stick ; but now the com- 
monplace was nearly shaken out of her, — her speech was 
grown more brief, and a ray of deeper light seemed to him to 
play upon her face. 

“ She must be innocent,” he said to himself ; “ but in any 
case I should think no judge or jury could be found who 

would” and he left the sentence unconcluded even to 

himself. 

Bessie, with her veil down, drew into a corner of the cab 
and cried quietly ; her companions let her alone and sat in 
silence. When they reached Berwick Street, Graham left 
them to go to business. Mr. Grant went up stairs with 
Bessie. 

“ She must be innocent,” was the burden of Graham’s 
thoughts. If a shade of doubt had crossed his mind, it was 
when he pondered the mystery of the thing, and forgot to 
think of Miss Barclay as the woman he knew her to be. 
Whenever he remembered her as she was, his doubt fled, 
ashamed of itself. This was enough for him ; but he had 
often sought evidence that the current of popular belief set 


334 


BLINDPITS. 


strongly in the other direction. He heard two of his brother 
clerks talking of it — for it was the universal topic of the 
moment, not merely in Ironburgh, hut over the whole country. 

“ She must he a cold-blooded sinner,” said the one, “ to 
polish off the poor old womay. as she did, then to rob the 
house, make off directly to the hank, lodge her spoil, and go 
hack to the funeral. I would have shirked the funeral if I 
had been her.” 

“ Her wits are not much sharper than her feelings, or she 
would not have made such a clumsy job of it.” 

“ I’m not aware that great criminals have ever been re- 
markable for intellect.” 

“ Ho ; but cunning might serve them better than it does, 
one would think. She needn’t have used arsenic, that can be 
so readily traced ; and she should have made no use of the 
money for a time, nor left the house in such a hurry. Poor 
wretch ! I wouldn’t give much for her chance of escape.” 

“ Would you not ? — and she is an educated person too — a 
governess ! ” 

“ A nice governess she must have been ! Becky Sharpe 
couldn’t hold the candle to her. By the way, Bichardson, you 
live in Berwick Street. Do you know anything of her ? ” 

“Yes,” said Graham, who had heard all the preceding 
speeches. “ Yes,” he said, as quietly as his worked-up state 
of mind would allow; “I know her intimately; I saw her 
this morning.” 

“ In the prison ? — I say, no ! ” they exclaimed, botli in a 
breath, witli quickened curiosity, not restrained by a sense of 
delicacy. 

“Yes, I did.” 

“ She is not — you are not related to her ? ” said one. 

“Ho ; I’m only very well acquainted. She and I have been 
good friends for a long time.” 

“ And what do you think of her now ? ” 

“Just as much as I thought of her before — rather more, 
indeed.” 

“ You think her innocent ? ” 


BLINDP1TS. 


335 


u As innocent as you are.” Then Graham gave an eloquent 
sketch of Barbara’s history; of her laborious, honorable, up- 
right life ; of her look that morning ; and finished by declar- 
ing his confidence that her innocence would appear. 

“ You believe it, any way ; and I hope the. jury will be con- 
vinced of it. Besides, I am not altogether in favor of capital 
punishments.” 

Graham turned sharply away, his face dyed by strong 
emotion. 

“ Man ! ” said the one clerk, grasping the arm of the other. 
“ you shouldn’t have said that to him. How would you like 
if I "were to speak to you of a friend of yours being 
hanged ? ” 

“ Pooh ! ” said the other ; “ he knows what the upshot is 
likely to be as well as I do. What difference does speaking 
of it make ? ” 

But it makes all the difference. What is fame, what is 
infamy, but the opinion of our fellow-creatures given voice to ? 
And Graham felt it as he went back to his desk. 

Infamy, to be sure, could not rest on Miss Barclay, but 
notoriety would ; a shade more, the acy'ective notorious would 
attach to her in all time coming. He turned the matter over 
and over in his mind, always with Bessie’s deep dark eyes 
before him, and her face blanched and scared as at the moment 
when she woke him into consciousness of his great love for 
her, and came to the conclusion that they must seek a home 
where friendly obscurity might rest on them once more. It 
w’as not the first time that the idea of emigration had crossed 
him, and now he resolved on it. Yes, with Bessie Barclay he 
would go to the world’s end ; and forthwith, all this misery 
over, he pictured a fair home in the Western Hemisphere, and 
touched it with all the rosy hues which the youth of twenty- 
one has so plentifully at his bidding. He lost sight of the 
present rude harsh facts in his dream of the future; it was a 
dream passing sweet. 

You have watched a rosebush covered with buds which all 
came a certain length and withered away; a worm — ugly 


336 


BLINDPITS* 


epicure: — was feeding on them. Be^ie’s happiness was 
withered up by this calamity. It was a fair bright delicate 

bud so lately ; and now She hovered about the room j she 

could not rest. 

“ Bessie,” said Mr. Grant, “you must leave this place ; con- 
tinued excitement of this kind will kill you.” 

“ It’s like a dream,” she said, “ a horrible dream — so like a 
dream, that I awoke this morning, and for half-a-second forgot 
all about it.” 

“ I wish I could make you forget it altogether. Try not to 
think of it so much, or to think of it as past, which it will be 
soon.” 

“ How can such things be ? how can such things be ? 
Aunt is one of the best women that ever lived ; how can she 
be accused of such a crime ? It is not just — not just ; ” and 
her thoughts ran backward and forward on this ground like a 
caged wild animal. 

“ You’ll make nothing of it, Bessie — you’ll make nothing of 
it,” said Mr. Grant, sadly, “ and you may as well give it up. 
You are getting the puzzle thrust cruelly home to you very 
early, but you’ll make nothing of it ; we can only believe and 
trust.” 

“ Believe what ? that all is right ? ” 

“ No ; believe in our own short-sightedness and Almighty 
wisdom.” 

“ It is hard.” 

“Very; but we must come to that or drift on a shoreless 
sea.” 

She leaned her arms on the table, and dropped her head on 
them, and silence fell for a time. 

When Mr. Grant spoke again, he said, “ I have done all for 
your aunt that 1 can do at present, and I must go back to 
Heatlierburgh. I cannot leave you here ; will you go to 
Grantsburn, or will you prefer going some whore else for a 
little?” 

“ My aunt proposed that.” 

“ Did she ? I’m glad of that. If I had seen her, I was 


BLINDPITS. 


337 


going to explain the necessity for it ; but she is thoughtful as 
usual. Then you’ll go to Grantsburn ? ” 

“ No ; certainly not.” 

“ Where would you prefer going ? ” 

“ I am going nowhere. I stay here. If grandmamma and 
Miss Dobbie wish to go, they can. Would you like me to 
forsake my aunt just now, Mr. Grant ? ” 

“You’ll do no good to her, and you’ll do yourself injury.” 

“ I can do aunt good ; I won’t injure myself, hut if I did it 
doesn’t matter.” 

“ It matters to me, Bessie ; you forget my claim.” 

“ No, I don’t ; if I could leave aunt at such a time I would 
not be worthy of you. I’m not so base. If I did, you would 
despise me, at least I hope you would — I think you would.” 

“But I am selfish. I want you away from Ironburgh. 
You don’t know what heartless impertinence you may he sub- 
jected to, besides the wear and tear of feeling seeing your aunt 
often would cause ; and you owe me obedience, remember.” 

“ Not just yet, Mr. Grant,” and a smile stole into her face ; 
“ and besides ” 

At that moment they were joined by the other ladies, and 
Mr. Grant explained his wish to them, and enforced it by say- 
ing it was the wish of Miss Barclay also that they should 
leave Ironburgh for a time. But whatever Mrs. Barclay was, 
she was Barbara’s mother, and she said, “ No ; I wish to be 
near poor Barbara ; ” and Miss Dobbie said, “ Why should we 
run away ? We have done no ill — Miss Barclay has done no 
ill — it is very mysterious. I’m sure if the thing had not been 
done, I would hav.e said nobody did it.” 

Mr. Grant went home alone to attend to his business, and 
bear himself as he might. His son ceased not to press his 
view of the matter, and it was the general view. No one who 
had come in actual contact with Barbara could believe her 
guilty, but the mouths of her defenders were shut by the ques- 
tion, “If she was innocent, who was guilty?” No theory 
could be framed that would stand examination; and Miss 
Barclay’s best friends began to tremble for the result. And 
15 


338 


BLINDPITS. 


all the while Barbara sat in her solitary cell, and worked and 
read, and to appearance possessed her soul in patience. Let- 
ters were sent to her from various parts of the kingdom, most 
of which took her guilt for granted, and exhorted her to con- 
fession and penitence while yet repentance was possible. 
Alarming tracts were sent to her suited to her supposed posi- 
tion among the dregs of the race, for generally they are not the 
wisest of mankind who rush into print, or writing, on the first 
blush of any public occasion. What effect these would have had 
if Barbara had been the offscouring of all things that the writ- 
ers believed cannot be known ; as it was, the blood glowed in 
her face, and she put them silently aside. She made no indig- 
nant protest — she was not indignant even inwardly ; for al- 
though, if it had occurred to her to address a person in such a 
position as her own, she would by instinct have done it differ- 
ently, it did not suggest itself to her that these loud harsh ap- 
peals were not suitable and appropriate enough. But on one 
of her visits Bessie saw them, and the fire burned within her ; 
she was roused to indignation that any human being should 
presume to address her good kind aunt in such terms ; that was 
the first aspect of it, but a more terrible was the indication it 
gave how the current of public opinion was setting against 
her. A scene which had excited her imagination when she 
witnessed it came up before her with an appalling thrill. A 
year or two before a man had been tried in Ironburgh for 
murder, and acquitted ; there was no doubt of his innocence 
in the minds of reflecting persons, but the mass of the people 
insensately held otherwise, and it had chanced that going 
through one of the most densely-peopled streets Bessie saw 
him — or rather a man supposed to be him — mobbed. She saw 
the old man — to deepen the picture he was an old man — with 
crimsoned face and drops of moisture standing on his fore- 
head, hustled and beaten and battered, amid the shrill voices 
of women and the deep-mouthed imprecations of men. The 
cry spread, and the crowd every moment grew bigger ; a mob 
is for the moment a wild beast ; and she shrank away home in 
terror. She heard after that the man found refuge in a shop, 


BLINDPITS. 


339 


but he and his pursuers haunted her dreams, and now they re- 
turned, all touched with a strange new horror. But even this 
did not daunt her, or only at times. Her aunt was innocent, 
and the truth must appear. 


CHAPTER XL VI. 


Graham Richardson, true to his promise to Miss Barclay, 
and to his own deepest wish “ to he kind to Bessie,” w r as in 
Mrs. Barclay’s house every day, or at least every evening. 
Sometimes he drew Mrs. Barclay into a game at backgammon, 
for humarf nature cannot he always at a high-pressure tension, 
and he earned Bessie’s gratitude warmly expressed. 

Many a time when Mrs. Barclay and Miss Dobbie, who 
waited on her like an Eastern slave, had retired for the night, 
Graham lingered and lingered in Bessie’s presence. That was 
enough — they did not speak much — they could not he always 
talking, and for talking of his love, that was what he could not 
do in the circumstances. How could he speak of himself, his 
hopes, his wishes, in such a crisis ? 

“ It is very good of you, Graham, to try to amuse grand- 
mamma — very good. I wonder if people would have thought 
us heathens if they had seen us to-night. Do you know I be- 
gin to understand how the people wLo were imprisoned at the 
French Revolution could dance and amuse themselves at such 
a time. I used to think it frightfully unnatural, hut it w T as 
only a desperate reaction. I think if I felt all the time about 
aunt as intensely as I do sometimes, I could not live.” 

Graham could not tell what to say ; he had a kind of blind 
faith that all would come right, although he could not see how 
it was to he, and he could only gaze at Bessie with a yearning 
tenderness. The bloom which she had recently gathered had 
gone out of her face, and the lurking mirth had gone with it. 
‘ Bessie,” he said, “ I wish it was over ; when it is, we’ll all 


BLINDPITS. 


341 


leave the country, and forget it as one forgets a had dream on 
a sunny morning.” 

“ All ! — who are all ? ” 

“Oh, you and your aunt, and grandmamma, and Miss 
Dobbie too if she likes ; and Pll go with you— if you’ll let 
me.” 

“ I can’t hinder you from going any place you wish to go; 
hut we’ll not leave this country — why should we ? we’ve done 
nothing wrong.” 

“ But it might he disagreeable to stay for all that.” 

“ Disagreeable ! the whole thing is appalling ; hut we’ll live 
it down. People will stare at us, that is natural. If any one 
in aunt’s position w^ere pointed out to me, my impulse would 
he to stare also. I don’t blame them.” 

“I think it would he better to leave the country. Are 
there many people you would reflet to leave, Bessie ? I’m 
sure, unless it is Mr. Grant, there are few I would ; hut he 
has been a true friend to me.” 

Her eyes glowed. “ He is good,” she murmured ; “ he is 
good. What would have become of us without him ? ” 

“ Yes ; and he does things graciously, and never by halves. 
Think of him sending me to the Continent last summer; it 
was very good of him.” 

“ It is a strange thing, a very strange thing to me, that 
aunt does not wish to see him ; and for all he has done for her, 
whenever I mention him she is silent, or speaks of something 
else. What can be the reason ? ” 

“ Is that — surely that can’t be the case ? ” 

“ You would think she would be eager to consult him and 
thank him.” 

“ One would think so. I have not the remotest idea of her 
reason. Perhaps she has no reason ; it may be accidental.” 

“ Ho, it is not ; it is a studied thing ; and you can’t think 
how it distresses me.” 

“ Don’t be distressed about it ; it’s a small affair compara- 
tively. Pm sure it will make no difference in Mr. Grant.” 

Hor did it. Perhaps he was glad to escape interviews that 


342 


BLINDPITS. 


could only be painful. The day of trial drew on, and people 
wondered what would be the line of defence ; and I imagine 
that even the prisoner’s counsel had not fixed on it till near 
the very last. 

That gentleman had received his first impressions of the 
case from Mr. Grant’s brief unvarnished statement, and he 
threw himself into it with a thorough belief in the innocence 
of his client. His first interview with her strengthened the 
impression ; but as he investigated his faith began to waver. 
The weight of evidence against her seemed overwhelming, and 
except previous character — there was ample and trustworthy 
evidence as to that — there was really little or nothing to coun- 
terbalance it. He almost resolved to throw up the case, and 
let another have the glory of winning it, for he did not 
despair of at least bringing the accused off. The presiding 
judge was a man of known merciful leanings, and a woman — 
a woman still young enough to be interesting, far from plain- 
looking, and of whom all that was known up to the date of 
this mysterious crime was in even an unusual degree praise- 
worthy, was likely to sway both judge and jury, and he had 
strong hopes of acquittal. But he would have given much to 
know that she was innocent ; and the day before the trial lie 
paid her a last visit, to see if by any means he could convince 
himself of it. 

When he entered her cell, Barbara was sitting on the edge 
of her bed, leaning her head on her hand. She welcomed 
him in her usual quiet way. 

“ I am glad to see you so calm, Miss Barclay,” he said ; “ I 
hope you will be able to be equally so to-morrow. You’ll need 
all your firmness.” 

“ The court will be quite full, I suppose.” 

“ Quite full ; and a great many ladies will be present. It 
will be as good,” he said, with a slight contempt in his tone, 
“or even better than a Spanish bull-fight.” 

“ I never was in a court,” she said. 

“ Conscious innocence will bear a person through much j ” 
and as he said it, he scanned her narrowly. 


BLINDPITS. 


343 


“At this moment,” said she, “I am equal to anything; 
how I shall feel to-morrow I do not know. If my strength 
or courage fail, will that he construed as an evidence of 
guilt ? ” 

“ They must not fail — they need not fail if” 

“If what?” 

“If you have kept hack nothing. Is there — can there be 
any hit of evidence produced we are not prepared for ? ” He 
paused. 

“ What evidence may he brought I do not know ; hut I 
have kept hack nothing. What could I keep hack ? ” 

“ There is no doubt that Miss Boston was poisoned. Have 
you formed no theory of how it was done ? ” 

Barbara flushed. “ I’ll make something out now,” he 
thought. She did not speak. 

“Ho theory?” he went on; “for the subject can’t have 
been out of your mind many minutes together since you came 
here.” 

“You are mistaken. I have tried to put it out of my 
thoughts, and I have often succeeded for a wonderful length 
of time.” 

“You have great strength of mind, yet remember this is a 
matter of life and death. Has no new idea occurred to you 

since I was here ? — nothing to account for ” 

“Ho.” 


“ You have not suspected any one ? ” 

“ I am falsely accused,” she said. “ I may have my sus- 
picions, but they maj^ be false, and I will not accuse another 
without a certainty that I may never get.” 

“ Hot ^ save, if not your life, at least your reputation?” 


“Ho. I have brought myself to leave the issue in the 
hands of God. I can only say I am innocent. Perhaps,” 
and she looked at him quickly, “ perhaps even you doubt me. 
I remember all criminals protest their innocence to the last. 
I am not a criminal, but I cannot do more — that is all I can 
do.” 

The gentleman rose ; his faith was re-established ; and he 


344 


BLINDPITS. 


went home to spend 4he night in preparation — the feelings of 
the man helping the intellect of the lawyer. 

He was only gone when Bessie, under Graham’s escort, 
went to see her aunt, for the last time in prison she hoped. 
She w r anted to comfort her and hear her up for the coming 
ordeal. , 

“ Aunt,” she said, “ I’ll sit beside you to-morrow ; they’ll 
let me, I think, and you’ll feel more at home.” 

“ At home ! Bessie, you must not ; you must not he in the 
court at all. Hone of you must come. I couldn’t bear it.” 

“ But, aunt, how can we stay away? You are cruel. Mrs. 
Dods and Miss Dohhie both want to be beside you, but one is 
enough. Oh ! let me.” 

“ Ho, it can’t be. You are all very kind, but it would be 
inexpressibly painful to me. You’ll hear the decision as soon 
as it is given ; let that be sufficient.” 

“ But we are not stocks or stones ; we must know how it 
goes on.” 

“ Then, I daresay Mr. Bichardson could let you know at 
intervals. He’ll do that; but don’t be present, Bessie; you 
must not.” 

“ Mr. Grant will be here early to-morrow.” 

Barbara bent her head forward, but did not speak. 

“How helpless we would be without him ! ” 

Barbara moved suddenly, with a kind of shudder, but she 
did not speak. 

“ 0 auntie, why will you not speak of him ? surely he has 
been kind ! ” 

“ To all appearance he has. He may well do his utmost, 
Bessie.” 

“ Aunt, you speak in riddles ; what claim have we on Mr. 
Grant?” 

“ I don’t know what the result of this may be, but if I am 
condemned, surely they will not carry out the sentence — it is 
too horrible. I cannot bring my mind to it, Bessie. I cannot 
— but if I die, I die instead of Mr. Grant.” 

Bessie started up, and looked into her face. “ 0 aunt ! this 
awful thing has turned your brain.” 


BLINDPITS. 


345 


“ No, Bessie ; I am thankful I am in full possession of my 
senses, although it does not look like it when I seek to relieve 
myself at your expense. But I must speak, and to whom can 
I speak hut you ? He’ll never he accused by me, hut I firmly 
believe Mr. Grant caused Miss Boston’s death.” 

“ O aunt, aunt ! don’t say that ; he never doubted you — 
never doubted you — never once doubted you.” 

“ How could he ? he knows I am innocent.” 

“ So is he,” said Bessie, and her voice was very husky. 
Before she came there that night it did not seem as if an 
additional shade of misery could be added to her lot, and now 
a double horror of great darkness had fallen upon her. 

“ I wish I could think so. You have been cherishing grati- 
tude to him for his supposed kindness to me, and now you feel 
the revulsion. My darling ! I wish I had not spoken of it, 
but I cannot bear your having intercourse with him ; and now, 
whatever happens, you will know that I am innocent.” 

Bessie sat with fixed eyes and cold pinched face. 

“ Bouse yourself, my darling, and leave me.” 
u Yes ; ” and she rose and went to the door without saying 
more, when the sense of her aunt’s position came to her again, 
and she turned and flung her arms about her neck. u 0 aunt, 
aunt, if only we were all asleep by Miss Boston’s side in yon 
quiet churchyard at Heatherburgh ! ” 

“My darling, my darling!” was all Miss Barclay could 
say. When the door shut Bessie out, the prisoner fell on her 
knees in a passion of weeping, exhausted, and in some sort 
relieved. When she lay down for the night she slept a deep, 
dreamless, blessed sleep. 


15 * 


CHAPTEE XLVII. 


Bessie clung to Graham’s arm, almost liung by it, and he 
walked along feeling what an exquisite thing it was that she 
should cling to him. But she did not think of him, not even 
as a living creature. If he had been a post it would have 
been the same to her. She held on by instinct, knowing that 
if she relaxed her hold she would swing round and sink on 
the street. He half carried her up the stairs, and when they 
got into the passage below the gas he looked at her and was 
scared by her ghastliness. 

“ You feel faint,” he said, and he put his arm round her. 
“ Don’t lose courage now ; in a short time all will be right.” 

“Yes, yes; oh yes; you’ll go beside grandmamma a 
little?” 

“You’ll come too — you must come — you’re not to sit alone 
to-night ; ” and it cost him a great effort not to draw her close 
and kiss her as he had once done before. 

“ I am going in here,” and she glided past him into her 
own room, shut the door, and sat down in the dark. Dark or 
light, it signified nothing; a chill as of death possessed her, 
and she was without the power of shedding a tear. Perfectly 
still she sat till Miss Dobbie, sent by Graham, came to her. 
She lit up the room, and proposed numerous remedies for the 
headache she understood Bessie to have. “ Leave me, just 
leave me, and don’t come back,” Bessie said beseechingly ; 
“ attend to grandmamma and Mr. Bichardson, that’s the 
kindest thing you can do for me.” Good as Miss Dobbie was. 
her presence was, at that moment, intolerable to Bessie. 


BLINDPITS. 


347 


Graliam looked anxiousty round when Miss Dobbie entered 
the parlor again, and as he listened to her chatter about the 
headache, what was good for headaches, and what she wished 
to do in this case, etc., how he chafed ! His feelings towards 
Miss Dobbie were not complimentary. 

“ Could you not persuade her to come here ? ” he said ; “ do 
try it.” 

11 But I think she is probably better where she is.” 

“ But she is not better ; ” and he thought of all the nights 
of her life that she should be alone for hours on this night, was 
intolerable — is must not be. 

“ I’ll try what I can do,” he said. 

He went into the passage, and softly turned the handle of 
her door. He said, “ Bessie, may I come in ? ” 

She did not answer. “ Do come into the parlor,” he said ; 
" you can lie on the sofa ; we’ll shade the light and keep quite 
quiet.” 

“ Oh, leave me alone ! leave me alone ! ” she said in a 
pleading voice that almost trembled. 

Graham stood irresolute. There she was — she whom he 
loved more than any one in the world, within two yards of 
him, in grievous trouble. Would he now tell her how much 
lieloved her? would that comfort her in any degree? He 
hesitated a minute ; she came to the door. “ Thank you, 
Graham, I would rather be alone — you are very kind — good 
night,” and she shut the door. His heart bled for her, but he 
could do no more. He went back to Mrs. Barclay, got out 
the backgammon-board, and invited her to a game. “ Not to- 
night,” she said, u not to-night ; I really cannot play to- 
night.” As she had said this every night since Barbara’s 
calamity, Graham went through the customary little scene. 

“ It looks heartless,” she said. 

“ Oh, never mind how it looks, it will do you good ; and you 
know we’ll have Miss Barclay with us before our next game.” 

“ Of course we shall,” said Miss Dobbie. I never heard 
of such an outrageous mistake being made . and persiste4 in in 
a free country.” 


348 


BLINDPITS. 


The game went on but tamely. Mrs. Barclay was Barbara’s 
mother, and she could not banish anxiety altogether; and 
every now and then a horrible misgiving crossed Graham’s 
mind, which, mixed up with constant thoughts of Bessie, 
made him an easy prey, even to Mrs. Barclay, on this night. 

“ A nice tit-bit it would be for the newspapers,” thought 
Graham, “ that Miss Barclay’s friends were amusing them- 
selves with backgammon on the eve of her trial. How the 
fact would point a leading article on the aberrations of human 
nature.” And, perfectly sick at heart, he urged Mrs. Barclay 
to another game. Then he talked, set himself to tell them 
the news of the day, for although there was such an awful 
pause in this household, the world went on its way. The 
Blindpits murder was only an excitement with which it 
played for a little, as a cat does with a mouse. The mouse 
might escape or be killed, it would equally sink out of notice, 
and the next meal might be innocent milk, till another mouse 
sprang on the stage, in its turn to be wondered at, worried, 
and forgotten. 

At length the ladies thought of going to bed, and so well 
had Graham filled his part that they werer rather cheerful 
than otherwise. He had dwelt repeatedly on the certainty of 
Barbara’s return next night, or the night alter, and with this 
bright hope and belief they bade him good-night. 

In the passage he said to the servant, "I’m going to be 
here all night ; I’ll be back in a little ; I’m only going to let 
Mrs. Dods know. I didn’t tell your ladies ; they would have 
made a fuss about a bed, or blankets, or something ; now I 
only want the parlor sofa.” 

“ Eh, Mr. Richardson,” said Mrs. Dods, “ hae ye seen Miss 
Barclay the day ? ” 

“No, but Bessie saw her.” 

“ And how is she ? ” 

“ Much as usual, but Bessie is ill — I’m sure of it ; whether 
it is anxiety about to-morrow, or whether her aunt has told 
her something, I don’t finow, but her very face has been 
changed, and she has shut herself into her room alone. I’m 
going back there all night.” 


BLINDPITS. 


349 


“ Wad it no be better for me to gang than you ? I might 
be o’ mair use.” 

“ If you’re needed I’ll come for you. It’s not that I’ll be 
of any use, it’s only because it will be a comfort to myself to 
be there.” 

“ Do ye ken, Mr. Richardson, I’ve aye jaloused, since Katie 
the servant tell’t me the state Miss Barclay cam hame in the 
day o’ the death, that she kent something mair than ordinal 
about it. Katie said she was liker a corp than a living being, 
maybe she’s been tellin’ Bessie what she kens ; it’s a ravelled 
hasp.” 

“It must come right, surely — good-night, Mrs. Dods and 
Graham went back to Mrs. Barclay’s parlor sofa. The ques- 
tion crept into his mind, in spite of himself — was it within 
the range of possibility that Miss Barclay was guilty, and had 
she confessed it to Bessie ? What short of this could leave 
such a horror-stricken, death-like look as he had seen on her 
face? But always, as he recalled Miss Barclay as he had 
often seen her in this very room — recalled her whole life and 
conversation — he said it was impossible ; it was anxiety about 
the issue, an overwrought mind, that was making Bessie ill. 

In the course of the night he slipped out of the room fre- 
quently and listened at her door, but heard nothing. He was 
wretched. He looked out into the night, but it was very 
dark, and little to be seen but the street lamps. Such a night 
he had never spent ; his one gleam of comfort was that he was 
near her. As the day dawned he fell asleep. 

And Bessie ! — what a night that was for her ! Poor girl ! 
she had not the matter-of-fact nature that belonged to her 
aunt. It did not at first occur to her to consider the likelihood 
or unlikelihood of the statement she had heard. The innocent 
happiness that had cooed and brooded in her heart, and which 
had still been alive though dormant, was killed at a blow ; 
more — she had lost her faith for the time in God and man — 
she was utterly forsaken. She had glimpses into that awful 
abyss of abandoned loneliness which, continued, makes mad- 
ness here, and will possibty make the hell of hereafter. She 


350 


BLINDPITS. 


was sent adrift in space alone, without end, or aim, or hope. 
Human beings are not made to endure very intense misery 
for a great length of time ; a chink will let in a ray, a rift in 
the cloud will show the blue ; and towards morning she threw 
off the blackness of darkness. 

She had not been in bed, hut she now threw down the 
clothes and lay in it a little to prevent that fact being known. 
Her nerves were so strung that to have Miss Dobbie making 
a fuss was more than she could hear. Then she went to a 
drawer, and took out Mr. Grant’s letters ; they had, of course^ 
all been written since Miss Boston’s death. She knew them 
almost by heart, hut now she tried (poor thing !) to read them 
dispassionately and critically. She came to the conclusion 
that no man with such a crime on his conscience could have 
written these letters, and she was satisfied with this result of 
her acumen. It was not' to he wondered at that months of 
solitary confinement, with such a charge hanging over her 
should have engendered strange fancies in her aunt’s brain, 
hut of all hallucinations the most extraordinary was the fixing 
on Mr. Grant as the guilty person ! Happily it would never 
he made public. 

She put the letters carefully past again. If she could have 
foreseen the occasion or the feelings with winch one day she 
was to read these letters for the last time, and burn them one 
by one, and all that was to happen between that and now, I 
know not how it would have been with her. I know not, in- 
deed. 

She went into the parlor, and stood in fixed surprise at see- 
ing Graham asleep on the sofa. How did he come there — had 
he lain down last night and never wakened since ? What a 
peaceful night he must have had ! His hand moved, and his 
lips seemed to move. Presently he spoke, and quite distinctly, 
“If Lucy should he dead?” he said. “He is dreaming,” 
she thought, “ and it is not a happy dream. Poor fellow ! I 
don’t wonder, he has been so much with us of late. Should I 
rouse him or let him sleep? he can’t he very comfortable 
there.” 


BLINDPITS. 


351 


She was still looking at him and considering, when suddenly 
he opened his eyes and saw her. 

“ Are you there ? ” and he jumped up and went to her. 
“ Let me see what like you are. Very white still, hut noth- 
ing like last night. What a fright you gave me ! I thought 
you were in for a serious illness. I was so anxious I couldn’t 
leave. I took the liberty of staying here unbidden.” 

“ I am afraid you wouldn’t sleep well there ; you were 
speaking in your sleep when I came in.” 

“ Was I ? Something very edifying no doubt ? ” 

“ You were quoting Wordsworth’s Lucy.” 

“The dismal impression I had about you turning ill last 
night must have been the nexus.” 

“ 0 Graham, how will aunt feel this morning ? She has 
forbidden me to come near her till it is all over. She said you 
would perhaps bring us word how the trial went.” 

“ Yes,” he said. He had not intended to be present ; he 
felt it would be very painful, but if it was to serve them, that 
was different. 

“ Is Mr. Grant a good man, do you think ? ” she asked. 

“What a question ! To be sure he is — very good.” 

“ He couldn’t do a cruel or wicked action ? ” 

“ Impossible ! ” he said, with a smile. “ Why do you ask ? 
Is any one accusing him of such a thing ? because if any one 
is, he’ll have difficulty in getting a single person to believe 
him.” 

“ If only this trial were well over, I think I might almost 
be happy again. How happy these people on the street are 
who have no horrible anxiety ! ” 

“ They may have more horrible anxiety than we have, Bes- 
sie ; they may be connected with people who are on the down- 
ward road ; but, whatever happens, we know that Miss Bar- 
clay is good — good to the core.” 

“ That, and that only, keeps me up, but some one must be 
guilty ; ” and a shadow came over her face akin to the look 
she had worn on the previous night. 

“ Don’t speak of it, Bessie, or think of it if you can possi- 
bly help it ; bright days are before us yet.” 


352 


BLINDPITS. 


She seemed to he looking at him fixedly. “Am I a 
fright ? ” he said, “ unkempt, with all yesterday’s dirt about 
me ? ” I 

“ I don’t know. I haven’t noticed. I wasn’t thinking of 
it.” . 

“ It is as well. I’ll away and make myself decent. Bessie, 
play the heroine ; let Mr. Grant see the stuff you are made 
of ; I should like him to know I have not overrated you ; ” and 
he went to brace himself for his day’s work — strange work, 
truly ! 

Mrs. Barclay having, with Graham’s help, contrived to keep 
the thought of Barbara’s position in abeyance for a time, the 
horror and precariousness of it returned upon her with re- 
doubled force during the still watches, and she endured such a 
night as made her quite unfit to leave her bed. Miss Bobbie, 
as a matter of course, devoted herself to her, and Bessie 
wandered through the house like a ghost under a ban. She 
could not rest — she was now beside her grandmamma, and 
now somewhere else. Mrs. Barclay, understanding that Mr. 
Grant was to be with them, asked what was to be for dinner. 
“ 0 grandmamma,” said she, “ we surely can’t think about 
eating to-day ; let Katie do as she likes, what does it 
signify ? ” 

But Miss Bobbie thought otherwise. She knew that young 
people may live on excitement, but people a little past the 
bloom of youth find themselves much revived and sustained 
even in deep affliction by kindly ministration to the bodily 
wants. Besides, she had never had any misgiving as to her 
friend’s fate, and consequently she relieved Mrs. Barclay by 
ordering a good dinner, so that cooking went on in the little 
kitchen where Barbara had reigned just as if she were to sit 
at the head of the table and dispense the viands. 

To Bessie it seemed as if everything held their misery 
cheap. The roar of the city went up as usual — the clank of 
the iron hammer, the roll of vehicles, the traffic and hum of 
people ; in the courts at the back of the house women hung 
clothes out to dry, in the play-ground of a school hundreds of 
childreQ were at play, and the sun shone. 


BLINDPITS. 


353 


<l Is there no sympathy ? ” she cried, “ oh, is there no sym- 
pathy ? What a tremendous wave of anguish must swell and 
break at the foot of God’s throne continually ; is there no 
sympathy even there ? ” 

She was standing with her hands raised as if in appeal, her 
young face full of grief and dismay ; if an artist had seen her 
at that moment, her face, transferred to his canvas in some 
tragic historical picture, would have brought him fame. 

Ho artist saw it, only Mr. Grant, and he did not view it 
artistically, his interest in it was too vital for that. He went 
close up to her, and put his arm round her. She drew away, 
and, sinking into a chair, cried ; — at last she got the relief of 
tears. 

He stood and waited a little. When she w r as quieter he 
said, “ Bessie, tell me all you are thinking.” 

“ It came hack on me,” she said, “ last night, that awful 
night. I was alone without shelter or hiding-place, wander- 
ing alone in the universe, and there was neither help nor 
sympathy.” She stopped and shuddered. 

a Were you dreaming ? it must have been a feverish dream. 
I ought to have taken you away whether you would or not ; I 
knew this excitement would be too much for you.” 

“ It was no dream. I didn’t dream what my aunt told me 
3 r esterday ; not in the wildest dream could it have occurred to 
me.” 

A pang shot through him. “ She hasn’t admitted her 
guilt; God forbid!” he thought. “Was it anything you 
could tell me ? ” he said, trying to speak without betraying his 
thought. 

“I must tell you, I must tell you. 0 Mr. Grant ! I can’t 
live in doubt; aunt, you know, is wholly innocent.” He 
breathed more freely. u But she thinks — she thinks — stoop 
down and I’ll whisper it,” and she whispered it. 

The ashy hue overspread his face ; he stood firmly grasping 
the hack of the chair, but did not immediately speak. In a 
second his color came hack, and he smiled faintly. (< Bessie, 
do you believe it ? ” 


354 


BLINDPITS. 


“ No, I cannot, I cannot ; oh, say it’s not true ! ” 

“ Will you believe me if I say it ? ” 

“ Say it’s not true — don’t trifle.” 

“It is not true, but consider, is a person who commits 
murder likely to stick at a lie ? ” 

“But you say it’s not true; that’s enough, you would not 
lie.” 

“Simpleton!” he said. “But Bessie, tell me how Miss 
Barclay is ; did she give any rational grounds for what she 
said ? I hope her mind is not affected ; that would be a sad 
calamity.” 

“ I thought it was that at first, hut she seemed in her 
senses, and said she was. No ; I did not ask her grounds ; I 
think I got into a stupor.” 

“ I don’t see how she can connect me with the crime, if 
crime there was. I was only in the house half-an-hour the 
day before Miss Boston’s death, and her food never was near 
me so far as I mind. No, the only crime I committed that 
day w*as theft, and here is what I stole, Bessie.” He took out 
his pocket-book and showed her the note she had written. 
“ Your aunt said you could do better than that with care, but 
you were very careless.” 

“ 0 Mr. Grant ! ” and in spite of everything the old happi 
ness crept into her face and glowed in her eyes. 

“And now, Bessie, I’ve been making inquiry in all quarters 
likely to know best what it is probable the verdict will be ; 
there can’t be positive certainty, but the general impression is 
that it will be favorable.” 

“Oh, I am glad ! it is a good thing there is something for 
dinner after all.” 


CHAPTER XLVIII. 


V 

The court was full ; if it had been twice the size it was it 
would have been filled to the door, and still plenty of people 
would have been disappointed of entrance. There was also a 
crowd round the building outside, discussing and speculating 
on the merits of the case, and eagerly catching any intelli- 
gence of what was going on inside. Graham and Mr. Dods 
had secured good places for scanning the faces of the jury, the 
bar, and the prisoner. As for the multitude round him, 
Graham was, after the first few minutes, hardly aware of it. 
He had perhaps hotly and without sufficient reason resented 
the highly intelligent curiosity, the idle love of excitement 
and amusement, the unfeeling hardness that led all these 
people there to batten and feed on the woe of a fellow-creature, 
but he forgot them. As for Mr. Dods, his interest was so 
great that he probably did not even look about him for mate- 
rial out of which to weave a new poem, and that is saying 
much. Mr. Dods had not been summoned as a witness ; Mrs. 
Dods had, and Mr. Pettigrew. If the occasion had been less 
the iron would have entered his soul ; as it was, he only deeply 
regretted that two such inadequate persons should have been 
called to such a conspicuous part in the drama. 

Barbara entered and took her place. She was dressed in 
black, with a veil over her face, but after sitting a few minutes 
she put it aside and braved the universal gaze unshrinkingly. 

Her usual sweet serenity of countenance had not forsaken 
her; naj' - , I think her morning prayers had been granted, and 
she had a measure of comfort. Owing to her brown com- 


356 


BLTKDFITS. 


plexion she did not look very pale ; and truth constrains me 
to say she had not grown thinner. 

Having gazed their fill, the members of the assembly not 
gifted with reticence began to whisper their remarks to each 
other. 

“ She has either no conscience or no feeling,” said one. “A 
charge of the kind against me, were I guilty or not guilty, 
w'ould have melted the flesh from my bones.” One lady, with 
a brow so large as almost to suggest idiocy, said, “ Her forehead 
is contracted in the extreme, and what a wooden simper that 
is on her face! — quite the criminal type.” A gentleman 
behind Graham said, “Til bet you a dozen of wine she is 
innocent. Why, she is pretty and plump, liker a partridge on 
stubble than a jail-bird.” And there w r as much more said, 
according to the tastes of the speakers ; and surely there were 
many who did not speak who felt deep commiseration for poor 
Barbara. Various people recognized her : the man at whose 
office she got the cab on the dark morning she went to Blind- 
pits, people she was in the daily habit of meeting on the 
streets, and others. Some of these felt their importance 
increased by the fact that they had seen and conversed with 
one who so filled the public eye, and such made the most of 
their great advantages. 

And there was one man in the jury-box who recognized 
Barbara — that was Mr. Goldie. He required a few seconds 
before he recalled the circumstance of having travelled with 
her one winter afternoon in the railway carriage from East- 
burgh to Heatherburgh. He had neither seen nor heard of 
her since, but that was the face which had attracted him 
then — which had recurred to him sometimes since, and which 
had even looked at him in dreams ; there undoubtedly was 
that face — he would have known it among hundreds — con- 
fronting him from the dock. 

Mr. Goldie was a sharp business man, who had kept his 
eyes open going through life, and like many poor people, 
rightly or wrongly, he fancied himself skilled in reading faces, 
consequently it was indeed a mighty surprise to. him to see 


BLINDPITS. 


357 


tliis face in such a position. In truth, it is to he feared that 
he had decided as to the prisoner’s guilt or innocence before 
he heard the evidence. 

When the question was put, “ How say you, Barbara Bar- 
clay, are you guilty or not guilty?” clearly and distinctly, 
and as if she expected a pupil to repeat the words after her, 
she said, “ Hot guilty.” 

Miss Jane Stark, Mrs. Dods, Bell, Davie, Mr. Grant, Miss 
Dobbie, Katie the servant, the medical man, the druggist who 
had sold Miss Barclay arsenic, Colonel Leadbetter and one or 
two more of Barbara’s former enployers and several others, 
were put on the witness-box ; and by examination and cross- 
examination all the facts of the case as I have stated them, 
and many of less importance, were elicited. 

Mrs. Dods was a somewhat unmanageable witness, as she 
continually wished to state what she believed rather than 
what she had seen and heard ; in short, wished to make a 
speech in Miss Barclay’s favor. Mr. Dods held dow r n his 
head, ashamed of his wife’s impulsive ignorance and non- 
forensic appearance; but what could you expect? and her 
heart was in the right place. 

The gentleman who cross-examined Mr. Pettigrew made sev- 
eral not very refined jokes at his expense, touching his reasons 
for visiting Blindpits, and his relations with Miss Bell Gibson. 
They raised a laugh among those who appreciated them, but 
were generally felt to be out of place. 

Bell Gibson had to explain her method of opening gummed 
letters by holding them over the steam of a boiling kettle. 
She and Pettigrew did penance for that base breach of trust 
in having their evidence shaken, and more than a shade of 
suspicion thrown on them. 

Barbara listened closely while Mr. Grant gave his evidence. 
He gave it clearly, and without drawback or hesitation, and 
she heard him say that he advised her to return to Ironburgh 
on the day of Miss Boston’s death. 

Miss Boston’s agent, in his evidence, stated that that lady 
had told him to send her £200, and giving her reason for 


358 


BLINDPITS. 


wanting that sum, a thing she very rarely did, that she wished 
to make a present to a young friend. (The probability is she 
intended it as a marriage-gift to Bessie.) 

Evidence led as to the character, life, and conversation of 
the prisoner, up to a certain date, brought nothing to light 
except what was lovely and of good report. 

Then the declaration Barbara had made was read, which 
explained why she had arsenic in her possession ; that on the 
morning she left Ironburgh, in taking paper from her desk, 
the small packet, unknown to her, got between the sheets ; 
that she did not know it was in her bag till her return home ; 
that Miss Boston gave her £200 the night before she died; 
that she left Blindpits on the day of her death, because she 
was advised to do so, and because the sooner the money was 
applied to its purpose the better ; that she had done nothing 
to cause Miss Boston’s death. In few words, that was the 
substance of it. This closed the first day’s proceedings. 

Mr. Dods and Graham had kept their seats all the time. 
Graham, finding from the crowded state of the court that 
ready egress and ingress were impossible, instead of reporting 
progress at Berwick Street himself, had, by the aid of a 
policeman, despatched at intervals pencilled notes. The great 
assemblage dispersed to their homes — the jurymen were locked 
up' — the judges and the bar dined — the prisoner returned to 
her cell ; but in every company, at dinner or at tea-table, in 
the streets and by the way, there was but one topic in Iron- 
burgh that night. 

Before Barbara was removed Graham hurried to speak with 
her. He was of course, by this time well know to the officials, 
and -had no difficulty in getting access to her. He seized her 
hand. 

“ It has gone well, dear Miss Barclay ; everything has gone 
well. You have stood it like a heroine,” he said rapidly. 

“ Has it ? ” she said with a sad smile. “ I wasn’t able to 
attend closely all the time ; my mind sometimes wandered 
into vacancy — being so much alone has induced that ; but it 
was a merciful relief.” 


BLINDPITS. 


359 


“Make the best of your solitude now,” he said cheerily; 
u after to-morrow night you’ll get no more of it. I’m going 
to Berwick Street. What shall I say ? ” 

“ Say/’ she began ; “ I cannot tell what.,” — and her voice 
trembled. 

Graham pressed her hand, and kissed it tenderly, and she 
had to go. He watched her get into the vehicle, while police- 
men kept hack the gaping crowd. On the way home he him- 
self broke down, and fairly sobbed for pity. 

Yet things had gone much better than he had expected. 
He saw a loophole he had not seen before — lawyers were 
really clever fellows. He remembered perfectly Mrs. Hods’ 
wonder as to how Pettigrew could have come by the informa- 
tion that Miss Boston had made Barbara a present of £200 ; 
but it had never occurred to him the use that could be made 
of that incident. He tried to shape out the speech for the 
defence as he went along. 

He was nearly as much at home now in Mrs. Barclay’s 
house as he was in Mrs. Hods’, and when the door was opened 
he walked straight into the parlor unannounced. Only Bessie 
and Mr. Grant were in it. They were standing before the 
fire on the rug ; his hand was on her shoulder, and he bent 
and kissed her just as Graham entered. Besentment was 
Graham’s first feeling ; but it flashed on him how silly he wfts. 
What more natural than that Mr. Grant should show his 
fatherly interest in Bessie at such a time ? 

“ Come away, Graham,” Bessie said cheerfully ; “ I’ve been 
telling Mr. Grant of all our obligations to you. You’ve won 
all our hearts, I’m sure — if indeed you had not done so 
before.” J 

He did not like the easy unembarrassed ring of her words ; 
but her dark eyes gleamed softly on him. Then he was 
secure ! — how secure ! nothing could shake his faith. 

There was little talking among them on this night. Each 
of them was full of the trial ; but it was a matter of far too 
thrilling interest in this house to be talked over ; they dared 
not do it. 


360 


BLINDPIT3. 


When they separated, Graham walked with Mr. Grant to 
his hotel. 

“ I am glad you like her. I am heartily glad you like her/ 
he said. 

“ Like whom ? ” said Mr. Grant, absently. 

“ Bessie — Bessie Barclay ; isn’t she a most lovable crea- 
ture ? I am pleased that you like each other.” 

“ Are you ? ” Mr. Grant said shortly. “ I’m glad to hear - 
it.” Then with a kind of' remorse, he said, “She is very 
lovable, Graham. I think any one falling in love with her 
should have great allowances made for him.” 

“ But,” said Graham, “ it’s not a silly thing to do ; it’s the 
most natural thing possible.” 

“ Yes, it is very natural,” he said, with a shade of sadness 
in his tone. “ Whether it is expedient or not is different.” 

“ How should it not he expedient ? ” 

“ A man old enough to be her father might commit that 
folly, and it might hardly he expedient even in his own eyes ; 
or a young fellow might, and find he had been forestalled — 
that wouldn’t he very expedient either.” 

“ Ah ; but Bessie has always lived among the untrodden 
ways,” said Graham ; “ she is safe.” 

“ I hope so,” said Mr. Grant. 

When he had shook hands with Graham, he looked after 
him. “Poor fellow!” he thought, “he’s as blind as a bat. 

It is very odd — I couldn’t say more, I think. Well, life at 
twenty-one has a great deal of cutting and coming again in 
it ; that is one good thing.” 


CHAPTER XLIX. 


Next aay the court was, if possible, more crowded than on 
the previous one. It was a fine spectacle. In truth, if you 
could have digested yourself of the knowledge that a fellow- 
creature was sitting there, enduring — whether guilty or inno- 
cent — a very slow, exquisite, and refined species of torture, it 
was enjoyable. Eor one thing, it was an intellectual wrestling- 
match played out before the three kingdoms ; and, months 
after, the solitary squatter in the Australian bush, and the 
little households spotted over the land below the genial skies 
of Xew Zealand, would hang over its details, and sharpen 
their rusting mental powers watching it. It was a tragic 
drama, the interest attaching to which was different from that 
of ordinary dramas, as the game is that is played for an 
immense stake, compared with the game that is played for no 
stake at all. And, say as you like, a crowd is something more 
than a mere collection of units. It is a collection of units 
held together by an electric current ; the invisible cable laid 
deep in the hearts of men since the beginning. 

When the prosecutor for the crown began his speech, you 
might, as the reporters phrased it, have heard a pin fall. He 
took up the points of evidence, one by one, and made a most 
consistent whole of them ; consistent, that is, on the supposi- 
tion of the prisoner’s guilt. That he proved almost to a de- 
monstration. 

u It only wanted,” he said, “ that some one had seen her 
shake the powder into that fatal basin ; but it was very rare, 
in these days of advanced civilisation, that the murderer was 
16 


362 


BLIXDPITS. 


cauglit red-handed. Where poison was the weapon, it was 
hardly possible ; the ease and secrecy with which it could be 
used had precluded that, and made this method of crime the 
horror of all ages. He dwelt on the medical evidence, which 
made it certain that Miss Boston had died of poison, and re- 
jected suicide or accident as being wholly untenable. There 
were others in that house besides the prisoner, but of none of 
these was it even alleged that arsenic had ever been in their 
possession. But it was in hers ; she had used it for killing 
mice, and had had it for years. She might have had it for 
twenty years. A man might have a dagger at his hand for 
twenty years, but he only used it when the temptation came. 
She carried this poison from Ironburgh to Blindpits, the ex- 
planation being that it got into her bag by mistake. That is 
possible/’ he said, “ it is possible, but is it likely that a lady, 
an elderly lady — and elderly single lady of known methodical 
habits — should carry a packet of rank poison about with her, 
not knowing she had it ? When she saw such serious illness 
set in, does she send off at at once for medical aid ? She does 
no such thing. Por her own ends she dilly-dallies till it is too 
late. Then her haste — he might say her indecent haste — to 
leave the house of her old friend the moment almost, after her 
death. True, a w itness had told them he advised her to do 
so. It w r as a lucky piece of advice that, jumping so exactly 
with her own inclination and plans. 

“We may think it unlikely, he went on, that a lady of her 
education and social standing should commit such an atrocious 
crime. It was unlikely ; for the credit of human nature, he 
was glad to say that it was very unlikely. He hoped women 
were scarce in any station who could watch with every 
appearance of devoted kindness by the sick bed of a friend — of 
an aged friend, wdio leant on them in the hour of weakness, 
and take advantage of that trust to extinguish the feeble 
remnant of life in agonising pain. This, the evidence drove 
him up to say, the prisoner had done. Hor was the motive 
far to seek. She was in w^ant of money; she knew the 
favorable terms of her victim’s will ; and she had also dis- 


BLINDPITS. 


363 


covered £200 of money ready to her hand in the house. She 
did the deed, and she took that money. A gentleman has 
told us that Miss Boston sent to him for that money, saying 
she meant to give it to a young friend. Was the prisoner at 
the bar that young friend ? He thought any affectation of 
gallantry at such a moment out of the question. The prisoner 
was not young ; she was a middle-aged woman, who had been 
pushing her own way for a score of years and more. More- 
over, Miss Boston had no idea, no expectation, of a visit from 
her. On the contrary, she understood she was not to have a 
visit from her at that time ; and we have been told she uttered 
an exclamation of surprise when she saw her. Surely, if that 
money had been intended for her, it would have been sent to 
her by the hand of her niece, who returned to Ironburgh on 
the very day she arrived so unexpectedly at Blindpits ; or, if 
Miss Boston had meant to forward it by post, she would have 
got it in the form of a cheque. Turn which way we will, 
everything, great and small, goes to prove the certainty of the 
prisoner’s guilt,” etc. 

That is a feeble echo of ‘ a speech which occupied three hours 
in delivery, and was generally characterised, and* justly so, as 
very eloquent. 

It would he difficult to depict Barbara’s state of mind, as 
she gazed at the speaker, and heard what he said. She per- 
ceived how strong the case was against her. However, that 
did not make her tremble ; hut when she heard Miss Boston’s 
painful death vividly depicted, and recalled the scene — her old 
friend’s great suffering, and strong-minded self-control through 
it all — and thought, if she had only taken the matter in her 
own hands, and got a doctor sooner, it was possible she might 
have been saved — her head dropped on her hand, and she shed 
tears. This was the only time throughout the trial that she 
faltered, and it was duly observed, and ascribed to a very 
different cause. When she heard herself hold up as a 
criminal of no ordinary dye ; driven to bay, the timidity of 
the woman, and the strong sense of propriety of the governess, 
had nearly given way, and she was on the verge of standing 


361 


BLINDPITS. 


up and pleading her own cause ; but she succeeded in keeping 
down her excitement, and sat on with at least the appearance 
of composure. 

The speech for the defence came next, and the eagerness to 
hear it was intense. What could the prisoner’s counsel 
possibly say ? He could not attempt to demolish the evidence, 
surely ? What Mr. Armstrong had set himself to do, was to 
throw doubt into the mind of the jury. If he could show 
that it was possible the crime might have been committed by 
some other person or persons, he felt he would gain his cause 
so far as saving the prisoner’s life was concerned. He 
admitted death had been the result of poison ; that the 
prisoner had had poison in her possession ; that she, and she 
only, had prepared and given the deceased lady the food that 
had been fatal — he admitted all that. He excelled his pre- 
decessor in depicting the frightful atrocity of the crime, 
supposing it to have been committed by the prisoner. She 
and her victim were of the same blood ; they had been life- 
long friends ; perfect trust was between them. In the deep 
gloom of a winter morning — gloom fitted for the contempla- 
tion of such a deed — she sets off, her weapon in her hand. 
She is warmly welcomed and kindly entreated by the old lady. 
The helplessness of old age is affecting even to a stranger; 
hut this woman is unmoved. She never wavers. When 
illness attacks her hostess she becomes the devoted nurse ; hut 
her nature is harder than the nether millstone. At one time 
she might think she would be saved the risk attending crime 
by the opportune death of her oldest friend ; but recovery 
setting in, that hope fails her, and she determines to 
extinguish the flickering life, to shorten the last days of her 
helpless relative by a death of acute suffering. If she did 
this — I say if she did all this — 

“ I did not do it,” burst from Barbara’s lips, in one loud cry 
that pierced the farthest corner of the building, and then she 
sank in her seat overpowered by excitement. 

The effect was electrical. The previous deep silence was 
broken by a hundred voices, cheering was heard, and decorum 
was only restored by a threat of clearing the court. 


BLINDPITS. 


365 


That impassioned cry carried conviction of the prisoner’s 
innocence to many minds, hut the far-seeing people — and the 
reader’s circle is limited if he has not met with some of them 
— the far-seeing people said that this little scene had been ar- 
ranged between the prisoner and her counsel ; nay, that they 
had practised it together; that he had got up his climax for 
the purpose, and that the repetition of his last words, u If she 
did this,” was the signal agreed upon between them when she 
w r as to let loose her cry. 

Mr. Armstrong saw to the full the advantage gained by this 
unusual burst of feeling, and he did not draw out his speech 
to such a length as to weaken its effects. He went on to say 
that sudden atrocity displayed by a person whose previous life 
had been such as the prisoner’s had been proved to have been, 
was unknown, indeed was impossible. Why not accept her 
explanation ? The simplicity of her account had the ring of 
truth in it, and was to his mind thoroughly satisfactory. She 
took the arsenic to Blindpits by mistake, and did not know of 
the mistake till she was home again. It was evident, if she 
did know of it, that she did not tell any one, and if she had 
used it as she was accused of doing, it was as evident that she 
would not say to any one, “ I have arsenic in my bag.” Then 
how was it known that she had arsenic in that bag ? for it 
was known — it was known almost immediately at Heather- 
burgh. He had seen a letter when the investigation was in 
its first stage. He had seen a letter from a gentleman in 
Heatherburgh to a friend at Ironburgh, stating that it was 
known, and could be proved, that she had arsenic with her in 
that bag. How was it known ? He would have liked that 
that had been fully brought out. He wished to accuse no one, 
and far less did the prisoner at the bar wish to do so. 

They had heard yesterday how a closed letter could be easily 
and neatly opened, perused, and shut up again. He begged 
to ask if the person who betrayed trust in that way was likely 
to refrain from peeping into a bag if she had the opportunity. 
Was it not all but certain that she would do so — that she 
would examine its contents ? Bar be it from him to say that 


366 


BLINDPITS. 


all persons of a prying inquisitive nature, wlio descended to 
base shifts to gratify their mean curiosity, were ready to com- 
mit murder; but was it not possible that the person who 
looked into that bag might possess herself of a portion of the 
fatal powder ? She had been in the kitchen while the sauce- 
pan containing the soup was on the fire, for three, four, or five 
minutes. A friend was with her, but that friend might be 
aiding and abetting, or he might be entirely oblivious, or he 
might see her seasoning the soup, as he thought, and forget 
such a trivial circumstance entirely. I am far from saying 
that she did that, but I say that it is possible, that it is at 
least as possible as that the prisoner at the bar did it. She 
might know that £40 accrued to her on Miss Boston’s demise, 
and that sum was as much to her as larger ones to other peo- 
ple. And as to the gift of money, it had been alleged that 
that statement bore falsehood on the face of it, because Miss 
Boston had intended it for a u young friend.” The crown had 
spoken of gallantry — he would speak of common sense and 
the experience of human nature. Was it unlikely, was it 
not rather most likely and natural, that a woman upon the 
verge of eighty should speak of another, not quite forty, as 
young? He believed the venerable father of the crown- 
advocate was still living. Did he address his son as his old 
friend, or did his son at forty consider himself an old man, and 
point out to his father his mistake in speaking of him as 
young? He himself found it impossible to believe in the 
prisoner’s guilt, and he was sure the jury would find it 
equally incredible. This again is the echo of another very 
eloquent speech. 

It was now the business of the presiding judge to give a 
dispassionate digest of the whole evidence — to hold the scales 
of justice evenly, and see that there were no false weights in 
either ; but do as he might he could not help throwing the 
weight of his opinion and feelings into what threatened to be 
the lighter one. As customary, he impressed upon the jury — 
and most earnestly he did it — that if they had any doubt they 
were to give the prisoner the benefit of that doubt. 


BLINDPITS. 


367 


The jury retired, and that was the signal for a general re- 
laxation of the fixed still attention of the assembly; there 
was a general subdued hum of conversation. The judges and 
the bar went out for refreshment, but the prisoner sat still, 
and leaning forward her head, supported on her hand, she shut 
her eyes, and, strange as it may seem, for a few seconds she 
actually slept and dreamed. She dreamed she was in 
the house she had lived in as a child; she had gone out 
into the park before the house, and was walking along a 
little narrow footpath, the very stones of which she saw and 
remembered, when suddenly she met her father. The bright 
smile of those prosperous days was on his face, his cheery 
familiar voice said, “ Barbara, where are you going ? ” and 
the effort to answer him roused her and brought hack upon 
her in full flood the reality of her position, which was far like 
a dream than the other — a horrible dream, fiendish and fan- 
tastic. 

The jury took time to consider their verdict. How far 
human beings can keep free of bias it- would be difficult to 
say. It is possible that had the prisoner been a man, or the 
penahy something short of death, the verdict might have been 
different. Mr. Goldie and another conscientiously believed in 
her innocence, and argued hard for a verdict of not guilty, on 
the ground that it was much easier to believe that death was 
the result of accident or the crime of another, than that a 
lady whose whole life had been even more than usually con- 
sistent and praiseworthy, should suddenly commit such an 
aggravated crime. But the others thought there was no 
getting over the evidence ; however, as another person had, 
almost to a certainty, had access to the poison, they agreed to 
a Verdict of “ Hot proven,” and amidst the breathless hush of 
the court that verdict was pronounced, and the prisoner set 
free. 

The cheering begun in various parts of the house, was not 
taken up. Probably most of the people there were thankful 
that the prisoner had escaped a ghastly doom, but the impres- 


368 


BLINDPITS. 


sion was general that she did not leave {he court with clean 
hands. Some newspapers did not hesitate to charge the jury 
with imbecility, and asked if the prisoner was to escape, who 
could consider himself safe ? 


CHAPTER L. 


And Barbara went home — bruised and bleeding she went 
home. Miss Dobbie, with her queer and enviable light- 
heartedness, had busied herself getting ready an elegant little 
supper to crown and celebrate the triumph she was so confi- 
dent of. She sat at the head of the festive board, and gaily 
pressed and smiled, but it would not do. Barbara could not 
touch food. All she could swallow was a glass of water. She 
sat, however, with a smile on her face — truly a wooden smile 
— and said she would be able to eat and drink to-morrow. 
Graham and Mr. Dods, who had been in the court all day, 
brought her home ; but they had left very shortly, supposing, 
in the circumstances, the family would prefer being alone. 
As for Mr. Grant, he had left the court the instant the verdict 
was given, and hurried to Berwick Street with the news ; but 
Bessie and he agreed that it was better he should be absent 
till Miss Barclay was disabused of her strange misconception 
concerning him, and he had gone away accordingly before she 
arrived. 

At the age of threescore we don’t expect a nature to 
change, or if we do it is very likely we shall be disappointed. 
Mrs. Barclay had not been her own chief object during life to 
begin to forget herself now. “ To think,” she burst forth 
after an interval spent in watching Barbara, “that my 
daughter should have been taken out of my house, cast into a 
common jail, tried in a criminal court, and sent back to me 
branded — branded for life by such a verdict! We were beg- 
gars before, but at least we had peace and obscurity to doze 
Dut our lives in.” 


370 


BLINDPITS. 


Barbara leant back on her cbair. u Mother ! ” she said, 
and- a shudder ran through her, “ Mother, let me try to ht 
thankful that I have escaped with my life.” 

“ 0 aunt — grandmamma — don’t speak of it — don’t think of 
it, it has been a terrible mistake, hut let us forget it. Other 
people will soon forget it ; and if we forget it, it will he the 
same as if it had never been.” 

“ Bessie, my dear,” said Miss Dobbie, 11 1 don’t exactly see 
how that can be. Your aunt has quite a remarkable memory 
for events and dates. Bor my part, I never could remember a 
date hut 1688, owing to there being two eights in it, I sup- 
pose, 'which make sixteen too. But we need not forget, as I 
have repeatedly said, we have nothing to he ashamed of. I’m 
sure if the thing had not happened, I would have said nobody 
did it.” 

A low cry, as of pain, escaped from Barbara’s lips, and 
Bessie had just time to prevent her falling, when, for the first 
time in her life, she fainted. Bravely she had borne up 
against her imprisonment, and braced herself for her trial; 
but, the great strain over, she could hear no more. Miss 
Dobbie’s well-meant tattle filled her cup of suffering to over- 
flow. She did not, however, lie for weeks unconscious in the 
delirium of fever; that might have been, at such a time, a 
blessed kind of oblivion ; but she had no fever, or other bodily 
illness, and so strong was her sense of duty, and her habit of 
doing it, that she rose next day and set about the business of 
life as if there had been no interruption. 

Bessie looked on with a species of awe at her matter-of-fact 
aunt as she took stock of household affairs. It would hardly 
have struck her more if one had risen from the dead to look 
out their few articles of plate, and sit down calmly to polish 
them, than to see -her aunt do it. Consumed with the desire 
of vindicating Mr. Grant, and ‘bringing together again the 
two people she loved most in the world, she dared not try to 
do it yet ; and while she restlessly moved about the house in 
a perfect fever of conflicting feeling, and every newspaper in 
the country was making either an innocent heroine or a guilty 


BLIXDPITS. 


371 


one of Barbara, there the object of their sympathy or wrath 
was sitting with a leather-duster rubbing up the old spoons 
that had grown brown in her absence. 

But though Barbara did not, and indeed could not, sit down 
in idleness to bewail her fate, not the less keenly did she feel 
it, — not merely the vulgar curiosity that caused people to stop 
and stare at and point out the house, and made it an impossi- 
bility that she should go out except in the shelter of a car- 
riage — not that which she had counted on — but not one of 
her late pupils came near her, or their parents. She tried to 
excuse them. Their conduct was natural, perhaps, but it was 
hard to bear. And while she bore all this misery, this 
obloquy, this desertion, the very name of the real criminal 
was unbreathed upon — he walked about in honor and pros- 
perity. Such were the thoughts that burned themselves into 
her about Mr. Grant, as Bessie, all unconscious, watched an 
opportunity to introduce his name. 

When the jury walked into court that day with their ver- 
dict, Graham’s heart almost stood still in mortal anxiety as to 
Miss Barclay’s fate. He believed her innocent, but if, not 
knowing her, he had been on the jury, he almost felt as if he 
could not have seen his way past the evidence ; consequently 
the verdict neither acquitting nor condemning her, but setting 
her at all events free, gave him unbounded relief. Mr. Dods 
and he shook hands and covered their faces with their hand- 
kerchiefs. When they left Barbara in her own home, Mr. 
Dods would have liked to have drawn Graham into the 
kitchen, to discuss with himself and Mrs. Dods the possibility 
of Bell Gibson’s guilt and Pettigrew’s complicity, but Graham 
went direct to his own room. 

He flung himself on the sofa ; he was very wearied, but 
very glad. The witchery of Bessie’s eyes gleamed on him 
again, and they fell under his gaze once more. He might 
now speak of his love. He had forgotten Sara Anderson, or 
if he thought of that passage of his life, it was to smile at its 
boyish absurdity. He envied the dull wall that stood between 
him and Bessie. He wondered if her tongue was wagging as 


372 


BLINDPITS. 


merrily as it once did. Of late she had been rather silent, 
hut then a woman does not rattle away like a child. He 
turned over the question of ways and means ; these were 
positively nil till he should get a situation, hut it was not in 
the power of such a consideration to damp his happiness. He 
knew nothing of Bessie’s legacy. You have seen the delicate 
web of a spider suspended between the forked twigs of a hush, 
the subtle threads besprent with dew which the sun makes 
diamonds of; surely the queen of the fairies has hung her 
embroidered mantle there, for it is unearthly in its beauty. 
What will become of it, left there exposed to every accident ? 
You go back in an hour, and it’s gone — lace, diamonds, work- 
manship, beauty, all gone ; torn, trampled on, blown to the 
winds ; that’s a picture of Graham’s happiness. 

Mr. Pettigrew was alone in his chamber also. His love, or 
plan rather, was also in ruins. What a pit he had escaped 
in taking time to consider before he had actually put himself 
in Miss Barclay’s power to marry ! But he was crushed in 
some measure by the turn affairs had taken. Could he 
believe his ears when he heard it broadly insinuated, and more, 
that he, Peter Pettigrew, had been aiding and abetting a foul 
murder ? But that on principle he avoided the law,’ he would 
have sued that man for libel. The very notion of being con- 
cerned in a murder made him feel that he would rather be in 
company than alone, so he went to the kitchen, and without 
invitation took a chair and sat down. 

“Well, Mrs. Dods,” he said, “you’ll be pleased with the 
result of this day’s proceedings, I think ? ” 

“ Ye’re wrang then. What’s the use o’ settin’ a dog loose 
wi’ a pan tied to its tail ? ” 

“ What other verdict could they hae gi’en, woman ? ” said 
Mr. Dods. “ It is a wise provision o’ the Scotch law, which 
allows ” 

“ Dinna tell me about wise provisions ; either she did it, on 
didna do it. The Almighty set a mark on Cain, but it doesna 
follow that the Scotch law had ony business to set a mark on 
Miss Barclay, ” 


O 


BLINDPITS. 


373 


“ Ye ken naetliing about it,” thought Mr. Dods. 

“The verdict ought to have been guilty,” said Peter ; “ and 
there might have been a recommendation to mercy on the 
ground of previous good character.” 

“Weel, she never lookit into other folk’s letters, at ony 
rate,” said Mr. Dods. 

“ Ay, Peter,” said his landladj’’, “ they turned you inside out 
yesterday ; however, T think opening letters is mair in your 
line than committing murder. I dinna think ye had to do wi’ 
it mair than Miss Barela}'-.” 

“ Who had to do with it, Mrs. Dods ? ” 

" That’s to be seen yet, Peter. It’s a kittle business as 
ever I heard tell o’ ; as Miss Dobbie aye says, puir body ! — 1 If 
it hadna been done, I wad hae said naebody did it.’ ” 

But it had been done, and Miss Barclay was the scapegoat 
upon whom the sin rested ; and common opinion said she 
should bear it away into the wilderness — go into exile, and 
for her own sake, change her name. Neither of these things 
did she intend to do. Nay, she would have kept by her origi- 
nal plan of settling at Blindpits, had it not been for its prox- 
imity to Mr. Grant. While her suspicion was so rooted and 
deep, she could not have any intercourse with him, however 
slight. 

This she very soon took an opportunity of explaining to 
Bessie, herself introducing the subject which her niece had 
been on the watch to speak of. 

“ There is no doubt, Bessie,” she went on to say, “ people 
will be convinced, and will not hesitate to express their convic- 
tions, that I am avoiding the scene of my crime. I must endure 
that, as I have endured all the rest. Vengeance is not mine, 
but if it were, I would leave Mr. Grant to his own conscience 
— it cannot always sleep.” 

“ Aunt,” said Bessie, putting an arm round her neck, “ you 
must be unhappy. How awfully wretched I was the night 
after you told me what you thought about Mr. Grant ; but 
next morning I asked him himself, and your very strange 
suspicion turned out to be perfectly groundless.” 


# 


374 


BLINDPITS. 


“ You had it on the best authority, had you ? Poor thing ! 
your knowledge of the evil that is in the world is small; I 
trust it will never he greater.” 

“ Aunt, Mr. Grant is not evil — he is good ; he has felt for 
you, and worked for you, and he was not even angry when I 
made that extraordinary revelation to him ; he was very 
sorrowful, for he thought, as I did at the moment, that trouble 
had turned your brain. He said he could not conceive on 
what grounds you suspected him, for he was only half-an-hour 
in the house that daj^ and never was near meat or drink.” 

“ He did not say that he stopped some minutes at the stair- 
case window where Miss Boston’s soup was standing ; that he 
stayed only a short time not to hinder her taking it; that he 
said to me there was no use sending for a doctor ; if he saw 
one of them he would give him a hint ; — he said nothing of 
all that?” 

“Aunt,” said Bessie, standing hack and looking at her, “ do 
you still mean to say that you seriously believe that Mr. 
Grant did this thing ? ” 

“ I have tried hard not to believe it, Bessie ; I have tried 
hard not to believe it, but I have been shut up to the conclu- 
sion.” 

“Aunt, what earthly motive could he have had ? ” 

“ Want of money is the most probable.” 

“ But he had no w T ant of money ; and if he had, all the 
rents of the estates pass through his hands — better steal than 
commit murder ! ” 

“ He probably had done that till he could do it no longer, 
and his own death or Miss Boston’s was his only choice to 
avoid shame and exposure.” 

“ Aunt ! I can hardly believe my ears ; you don’t expect me 
to share such an extraordinary delusion ? ” 

“ The delusion is not more extraordinary than what thous- 
ands have entertained about me. Whether you share it or 
not is a matter of no practical moment ; we shall have no 
occasion to see him again. If I am wronging him, I hope to 
be forgiven; the wrong will go no further than my own 
thoughts.” 


BLINDPITS. 


375 


“ Aunt, when you w T ent to Blindpits that day and found I 
had left, did you not wonder why I had left ? ” 

“ I thought you were longing to get home ; was there any 
other reason ? ” 

u Yes, there was; I wished to speak to j^ou — I wished to 
tell you something that had happened ; and then from one 
time to another I put off telling you till some happier oppor- 
tunity, and now, auntie, I am afraid to give you pain.” 

Miss Barclay smiled faintly. “ I am so seasoned to pain 
now, Bessie, it seems my natural element — a little more or 
less hardly signifies.” 

“ Aunt, I wouldn’t add to your pain by a straw-breadth if 
I could help it. Don’t he startled, auntie, hut — I am — 
engaged to marry Mr. Grant.” 

A cry escaped Miss Barclay ; she rose from her seat, and 
her quiet dark eyes actually flashed. “ He cannot have been 
so base — to take advantage of such a time when I was not 
there to protect you ; he might well have been content with 
putting my life in danger and blasting my good name.” 

“ Stop, aunt, stop ! I cannot listen to that; he did not take 
advantage of me while unprotected ; I w r as with Miss Boston, 
and she knew and approved of it.” 

“Bessie, we must go away; perhaps w r e had better leave 
the country at once, and see if we can find any termination to 
all this misery.” 

“ It is a sheer hallucination, aunt. Mr. Grant is good and 
noble ; I pin my faith to him for all time.” 

“ Base and treacherous ! ” repeated Miss Barclay, hardly 
aware of what Bessie had said ; “ a man of his age to impose 
on your youth and innocence; if you had only known him 
sooner as he is ; but let us be thankful it is not altogether too 
late.” 

“ Aunt, after all this cruel business I love you as I never 
did before ; but it is impossible — I say it is impossible — I can 
give Mr. Grant up.” 

Miss Barclay looked at her niece as if in a dream. She 
said at last, “ That is a strange thing to say. When I was 


376 


BLINDPITS. 


your age it would not have occurred to me to say anything like 
that to my father or mother.” 

“ 0 auntie ! I can’t help it. What would you have me say 
or do?” 

“ I would have you to he advised. You must have changed 
sadly if I have no influence with you. Do you think your 
welfare is less to me than my own ? It is more, much more ; 
it has been my first thought ever since you came to me a little 
child of three years old.” 

“ I know it, aunt ; I know all your patience, and toil, and 
love. Oh ! throw away prejudice, and believe in Mr. Grant’s 
goodness — will you, auntie ? ” 

“Bessie, you are very young; you have known him a very 
short time, even if he were good. I am asking no great 
sacrifice when I wish you, for my sake, to see him no more. 
Be dutiful, my darling.” 

“ Auntie, be pitiful ! I love you ; nothing shall part thee 
and me ; but I cannot — I cannot give up Mr. Grant.” 

“ Hot if I command you ? ” 

“ Ho, not if you command me.” 

“Bessie, if I can separate you in no other way, I shall 
expose that man to the world before I stand by and see you 
sacrificed to him — my lamb, my innocent lamb ! ” — and she 
sobbed. 

Bessie grasped her arm. “ Aunt,” she said, “ Mr. Grant’s 
name may be trailed through the mud, but I’ll stick to him 
through all the obloquy, as I have stuck to you; it is a 
groundless and hideous hallucination that possesses you.” 
Her excitement was great. 

Miss Barclay had grown very white ; her face had a drawn 
stony look, as if from severe pain. Bessie put her arms round 
her. “ 0 auntie, hear me ! I don’t mean that I’ll marry him ; 
I won’t do that against your will ; but I must believe in him 
and love him — I can’t help that. Aunt, aunt, have I fright- 
ened you, after all you have suffered already ? ” She was on 
her knees before her, and she laid her head on her lap and wept 
bitterly. It had been long a childish trick of hers to lay her 


BLINDPITS. 


<"Wrr 

Oil 


head on her aunt’s lap, and have her hair stroked, and almost 
unconsciously Barbara began to stroke it now. But she had 
become aware that the child she had nourished so long had 
passed away ; the child was gone, and the woman was there, 

who had divided the love that was once all her own with 

And for an instant Barbara lost consciousness and nearly 
fainted. 






CHAPTEE LI. 


It was midsummer all over the country, leafy and warm. 
The earth carried the prospect of an abundant harvest ; the 
cattle on a thousand hills were rejoicing; the burns were sing- 
ing in the glens, the larks at heaven’s gate ; and the insect 
world were floating lazily in the sun, or whirling in the mad- 
dest of 'all Scotch reels; even the swallows were darting in 
and out of their nests, built in the windows that had been 
Miss Boston’s — all as if there had been no celebrated Blind- 
pits trial case. Heath erburgli had talked itself dumb over it, 
from the Marquis to the parish pauper. They had made it 
their meat and their drink, till the disgust of satiety had set 
in, and the subject was dropped. Even the Misses Stark 
could go into their garden and discuss the fruit prospects and 
the possibility of a night’s sharp frost even at that season, 
without allusion to Blindpits, that house being within their 
view, and Miss Jane having had the very extraordinary fate 
of being a witness at the trial. 

Mr. Grant carried himself well. Originally only Mrs. 
Ainslie hud guessed his feelings towards Bessie, and she came 
to the conclusion that recent events had altered them, at what 
stage she did not know ; for in endeavoring to draw out his 
confidence — it was one of her points, the many people who 
came to pillow their griefs, and cares, and joys on her sympa- 
thies — he frankly discussed the matter with her from the 
spectator’s point of view, without betraying to her observation 
more than a spectator’s interest. 

Three months had now gone by since the trial, and in all 


BLINDPITS. 


379 


that time he had only seen Bessie once. It was when, in spite 
of her request that he would not come, he had gone to have an 
interview with Miss Barclay himself, and had met her niece 
on the stairs as he was going up. She entreated him not to 
go farther. 

“ Although you do,” she said, “ aunt won’t see you ; hut do 
not try it, do not agitate her just now.” 

“ But it is unreasonable. I must see her some time : we 
are not going to wait for ever. You must love her much more 
than you do me, Bessie ; come, do you ? ” 

“ She is alone and in affliction ; you have everything.” 

“ Ho, I haven’t ; I have not my wifej her shadow flits about 
all the corners yonder at Grantsburn, hut I must have the 
substance.” 

“ Oh, come, don’t let us stand here ! I’ll walk with you 
anywhere ; where are you going ? ” 

“I’m going nowhere; I only came to see your aunt and 
claim you. I don’t know that I should yield, and he foolish 
enough to go away without doing the business I came for.” 

“Mr. Grant, if aunt were in ordinary circumstances, and 
objected to me marrying you, I would run away . with you at 
once ; that is, if you wished it,” she said simply. “ But she 
is under a ban ; I can’t leave her — I can’t,” and she looked 
into his face entreatingly, her eyes filled with tears. 

“ Come,” he said, “ we’ll w r alk.” They went to the end of 
the street. “Perhaps we had better drive,” he said, and 
they got into a cab. “ How,” he said, “ we can speak of what 
is to be done ; what do you think ? ” 

“ I can think of nothing.” 

“ But something must be done. I’ve got the old house all 
brushed up. I daresay I would have brushed up the sea, if I 
had thought I could make it look better from the windows.” 

“ You might have tried.” 

“ You’ll try it ; it will look much brighter to me when you 
come ; every hour of the day I fancy you yonder, my wife ; 
and you won’t come.” 

“ I can’t — I cannot.” 


ssa 


BLINDPITS. 


“ There’s Graham away past,” he said ; “ where is he post- 
ing to ? he did not see us.” 

“We see him nearly every evening.” 

“ Oh, indeed ! ” 

“ Yes ; aunt is fond of him.” 

“I don’t object to that. I’m fond of him myself.” 

“ So am I. He is the best man living except — no, not even 
except you. He has been kind all through this terrible time ; 
while I live I’ll never forget his kindness.” 

“ Does he expect any return, think you, Bessie ? ” 

“ Return ! no ; what could be a return ? you know him bet- 
ter than to suppose that.” 

“ Ho, I don’t ; I really don’t ; I am sure he would be kind 
in any case, but maybe he looks for some sort of return.” 

“ Hush, not that ; oh, I hope not ! ” 

“ Poor fellow ! ” 

“Do you think there is any unalloyed happiness in this 
world, Mr. Grant ? ” 

“ I think there is, or some thing very like it. When I have 
got you, to have and to hold, Bessie, away at Grantsburn yon- 
der, shall we be happy or not, do you think ? ” 

“ But if we know that other people are miserable ? ” 

“We’ll turn selfish, and forget other people, and that brings 
us back to the question — What’s to be done ? If you’ll not 
let me see your aunt, may I write to her? Unless she’s stone, 
I hope to make her see reason.” 

“ Yes ; you might try that ; it would be better than speak- 
ing — less distressing to her I mean. Whether it would do 
any good, I doubt.” 

“We’ll try it. We’ll try all fair and reasonable means 
first, Bessie.” 

“ And last too. If these fail, we can do nothing more,” she 
said sadly. 

“ We can run away. Mind, that’s your proposal, not mine. 
But I’ll be quite willing. What would you think if I were to 
do it just now, whether you will or no, like some of the nice 
villains in the old novels ? Would Graham start up to the 


BLJNDPITS. 


381 


rescue, do you think? I sometimes wonder at my own 
patience. You don’t expect me to excuse your aunt and feel 
amiable very long, do you ? ” 

“ I suppose I can’t expect it. Indeed, I don’t know which 
way to look for comfort.” 

“ Look to me. Look at me now. When am I to come to 
give you another drive ? Tell me, shall I come every day ? or 
how often ? ” 

II Oh, not often ; it would he too much. I can live on this 
for a long time.” 

u But I can’t. I’ll he as hungry at this time to-morrow as 
ever, and what am I to do ? ” 

“ I don’t know. Surely something must happen to put an 
end to all this miserable uncertainty, although I can’t see 
how.” 

II I tell you what, Bessie — if your aunt persists in holding 
to her delusion about me, we must act independently of her. 
There is nothing else for it.” 

u It’s more like insanity than anything else ; and yet in all 
other things she is the same Aunt Barbara she ever was.” 

Bessie went home with a light in her eye, to live on the 
strength of this stolen interview for many days. Mr. Grant 
went back to Grantsburn, pondering more deeply than ever 
if possible, the Blindpits mystery. Only the great suffering 
Miss Barclay had undergone made him tolerant for a moment 
of her suspicion of himself. She was driven, in her bewilder- 
ment, to some theory ; and she had adopted what she thought 
most likely. He forgave her. But that Bessie and he should 
be martyrs to her delusion was what he did not mean to sub- 
mit to. His own theory of Miss Boston’s death was that it 
was accidental ; but Dr. M’Vicar was the only person in the 
district that agreed with him. His son, John Grant, lost no 
opportunity of proving to his own satisfaction the impossi- 
bility of an accident of the kind. The lawyers had thrown 
the suggestion aside as useless. Still he clung to it. Unless 
he was correct in that, then he could not help being compelled 
to return Miss Barclay’s compliment, and consider her guilty. 
That he could not do. 


CHAPTER LII. 

As has been said, it was midsummer ; and Ironburgh, or 
that portion of it possessed of the means, bad scattered itself 
to countiy quarters ; and still the Barclay household sat shut 
into their flat, till Mrs. Barclay, who had been showing a de- 
gree of tenderness to Barbara since she had seen her in that 
deathlike faint, proving that she had nerves like other people, 
could contain herself no longer, and asked if they were to sit 
still in this little oven all summer, and be suffocated like rats 
in a hole. 

They had been strange weeks to Barbara, since she had got 
back to her home, spoiled of her good name, to find that even 
that was not to be the limit of her misery. She felt dazed, 
except when she was roused by the determination at all 
hazards to save Bessie from the fate that threatened her. It 
was a subject, however, that was never mentioned between 
them, and in this lay peculiar and exquisite bitterness. They 
no longer had all things in common — they could not take 
counsel together. Hot only was the loving and obedient child 
gone, whose pleasant ways had been the life of the house, but 
in her place there was a woman resolute and reticent, and 
carrying her own burden of care, young as she was. 

The man of Uz was hardly more completely spoiled than 
Barbara ; only friends did not come round her, even to reproach 
her. Except her own household and that of Mrs. Dods, her 
acquaintance kept aloof. To her it was a matter of perfect in- 
difference where she was ; but when she took in the sense of 
her mother’s complaint, she aroused herself to arrange their 


BLINDPITS. 


383 


immediate removal. There was no obstacle as in years gono 
by — time was her own, and money they had in plenty. When 
Graham came in the evening, as usual, he was surprised. 
There was a breeze at last in the still depressed atmosphere, 
that he had so often of late tried to fan into fresh motion. 
That something was wrong between Miss Barclay and her 
niece he had seen, and he had been fairly mystified. It was 
in vain for him even to guess ; but it was evident the relations 
between them were changed. He had gone the length, when 
opportunity had offered, of sounding the two ladies, but had 
found them more ignorant than himself for they were not 
aware of any difference, and were sure there was none. 

On his entrance, Miss Dobbie hailed him with the informa- 
tion that by that time to-morrow they would be en route for 
the Continent ; she had been on the Continent many years 
ago, etc. Then she and Mrs. Barclay went into a comparison 
of the then and now facilities of travel. Miss Barclay was 
sewing, and looking more like herself than Graham had seen 
her since the never-to-be-forgotten night of her arrest. Bessie 
was seated at the table, writing a letter it seemed. Graham 
could not forbear watching her, and wondering to whom she 
was waiting. 

He momentarily expected Miss Barclay to look across and 
ask that question ; but she did not. The time was past when 
she could do that, and even look over her niece’s letters to see 
that they were all right in point of composition, grammar, and 
spelling. 

Besides, Bessie’s letter was to be read by a partial eye. A 
governess would be horrified by a mistake, which a lover 
would think the most delicious characteristic little blunder 
that ever was made. Graham watched her when she ad- 
dressed the envelope. He was pretty sure that the last word 
was Heatlierburgh. • It was not that he was jealous ; jealousy 
dil not occur to him. It was that he felt he had a right to 
Bessie, and everything that was hers. 

She had been writing to Mr. Grant under the influence of 
hope, strong young hope, that had been fed that day by the 


384 


BLINDPITS. 


presence of Mr. Grant himself. As she wrote she sometimes 
rested her head upon her hand for an instant, and Graham 
could see her face then. Her eyes were deep and bright, a 
smile played about her mouth, and she did not seem conscious 
of the presence of others. Could the letter he to Mary 
Grant ? or to one of the Misses Stark ? or more likely still 
Susan Ainslie ? When she had done she put it in her desk 
and locked it. Graham said — 

u I could post your letter for you if you liked.” 

“ Oh, thank you ! no. Katie could do it if there was any 
hurry ; hut to-morrow will do quite well. How, auntie, I am 
ready if you have anything for me to do.” 

Graham had fully determined that after Miss Barclay’s trial 
was happily over, he would let Bessie know his hopes and 
wishes; and here he was as far from that point as ever. 
There seemed some intangible thing to hang in the air which 
prevented him. It was not want of opportunity ; for many a 
time he lingered till Bessie only was left to keep him com- 
pany, and one after another he had let these opportunities slip. 
It was not that he waited for encouragement ; that he would 
run no risk till he was sure. He would have run any risk ; 
besides, he did not think the risk was great. Hor was it that 
he met with discouragement. She was thoroughly at home 
with him. She would sit and work away, and speak or not 
speak, as it occurred to her ; and often he watched her in 
silence — that silence which is the “floodgate of the deeper 
heart.” 

Many girls could not appreciate that kind of homage ; hut 
Bessie could — only she was pre-occupied and did not notice it. 
It did cross her mind, however, at a rare time, that Graham 
might get beyond a brotherly interest ; hut, as her hopes and 
wishes were against it, she saw most clearly what confirmed 
these hopes and wishes. Tender and true as she was, there is 
little doubt that she was selfish in her love ; or at least she 
was so engrossed, that she held to her theory, that all Gra- 
ham’s attention, constant and unwearied, was kindness, not 
love. Graham lingered on this night. She was going to- 


BLINDPITS; 


385 


morrow, and he could not let her go away out of his sight 
without coming to an understanding. 

“ You are going away to-morrow ? ” he said. 

“ Yes ; so it seems.” 

“ You are looking very bright about it.” 

“ Not at all. If I’m looking bright, it is not about that. 
Just at this moment I would rather stay here.” 

“ Would you ? Ah ! but you’ll all be the better for it. 
Perhaps you’ll go over the ground I went the last summer. 
I’ll let you see my route, and give you the benefit of my small 
experience.” And he brought an atlas, over which their 
heads were presently bending. 

“ It’s a sudden idea this, of your going away.” 

“ Yes, it seems so ; but I fancy aunt must have been think- 
ing of it for a while.” 

“ What ? — and not say anything of it to you ? ” 

“ It was not necessary that she should tell me.” 

“ No, it was not necessary of course ; but ” * — - 

“ But what ? ” 

“ Miss Barclay did not use to keep secrets of that kind from 
you.” 

“ Ah ! you have noticed, have you ? I wonder if I might 
tell you about it ? I would like your opinion, Mr. Kichardson. 
Yet I dare scarcely say it. It is the hardest thing to bear ; 
and aunt must be wretched, I’m sure.” 

“What is hard to bear, Bessie?” he said, looking eagerly 
into her face, which had got back the sober, wistful look, which 
was most common to it at this time. 

“ Estrangement between aunt and me. Do you; know any- 
thing of mental disease, Mr. Bichardson.” 

“ I don’t like to be Mr. Bichardsoned by you, Bessie. Call 
me Graham ; why not ? ” 

“ There’s no reason against it that I know of. But you 
have not answered my question. Do you know anything of 
mental disease ? ” 

“ Very little, I am thankful to say. But why do you 
ask?” 

17 


386 


BLIKDFITS. 


“ You know nothing of monomania ? ” 

“ I know there is such a thing — a hallucination on one 
point, while the mind is clear on every other/’ 

“ Don’t he startled j hut I’m almost driven to the conclusion 
that aunt is a monomaniac ! ” 

“ Bessie ! ” 

“ Mr. Grant has had that idea all along since I told him ; 
but I would not let him say it. Only to-day he was here to 
try to reason with her ; hut I intercepted him on the stair. 
She could not bear it now. And, oh, if trouble has really 
touched aunt’s mind, how awful that would he ! ” And she 
held her head down to hide the tears that sprang from her 
eyes. 

“ Awful, indeed,” said Graham ; “ hut it’s nonsense. Mr. 
Grant hardly knows her. Depend upon it, she is no more a 
monomaniac than I am ; not so much, because I am possessed 
by one idea just now.” 

“ It had need to he a pleasant one ; aunt’s is hideous.” 

“ What is it ? I can guess nothing hideous.” 

“You remember the evening when you took me to see her 
the last time before the trial.” 

“ I’ll never forget it, nor your face when you came home.” 

“ I never endured such a night as that in my life. She told 
me when I saw her — what do you think she could possibly tell 
me?” 

“That had the effect of making you look like yon? I 
can’t possibly imagine.” 

“ She told me she believed Mr. Grant had poisoned Miss 
Boston. She believed that then, and she believes it yet. 
What do you think of that ? ” 

“ That’s a hallucination with a vengeance. Does she give 
any reasons for it ? ” 

“ None, except that he happened to be in the house that 
day, and passed Miss Boston’s dinner on his w r ay up stairs. 
It was standing on the window-sill, and she says she heard 
him stop at the window for a minute or so.” 

“ You did not believe it when she told you ? ” 


BLLN'DPITS. 


387 


“ I think I must, till I came to my senses ; I had been so 
accustomed, you know, to rely on aunt’s word and opinions ; 
but not when I got time, and asked Mr. Grant next morn 

ing” 

“And he didn’t admit having done it? I would like to 
have seen his face when you asked him.” 

“ His face grew quite gray ; but he did not seem to mind it 
much.” 

“ I daresay not. Mr. Grant commit murder ! carry about 
powder with him ready to shake into an old woman’s soup, 
should he get the chance ! It’s an idea worthy of a romance 
of the middle ages.” 

“Well, it’s aunt’s idea, I assure you, and nothing but the 
unravelling of the mystery will ever make her think other- 
wise.” 

“ That was the reason then she avoided Mr. Grant ? no 
wonder ! But have patience, Bessie ; when she has had a 
while to throw off the effects of this wretched time, her mind 
will regain its tone, and she’ll see her error. It can do Mr. 
Grant no harm, but it’s a thousand pities for herself, and for 
you — for you — my darling ! I may speak now, may I not, 
after holding my tongue so long? But you know it, Bessie; 
you know my love for you, and you’ll be — will you not ? ” and 
he drew her nearer to him ; — “ you’ll be my ” 

“ Don’t,” she cried, as if in pain ; “ don’t, don’t ; 0 Mr. 
Bichardson ! I thought you must have seen. Surely I have 
not deserved this ? Have I done anything to bring this on 
you and me?” 

“What is it, Bessie ? ” he said kindly. “ What is it that I 
have not seen ? I have seen you in all phases. What a dream 
I had on that sofa of your death, when your looks gave me 
such a fright ! and when I awoke there you were standing by, 
to thrill my soul with hope.” 

“Stop, stop, Mr. Bichardson. Can nothing but death 
happen to Lucy ? ” 

“ Hot to my Lucy. Only death shall part thee and me.” 

“ Mr. Bichardson,” she said, sadly, “ I would have done 


388 


BLINDPITS. 


anything to prevent this. I thought I had done something. 
We can never forget your kindness, hut — hut” 

“But what, Bessie? What is it? Tom Ainslie 
hasn’t ” 

“ No, no ! ” 

“ What is it then ? 99 

“ I’m engaged to he married.” 

She spoke as low as if she had heen confessing a crime, — as 
if she were sinning against Graham’s goodness. He seized 
her hand — 

“ I can’t believe it — I must have known it — there is no one 
— say that’s not true, Bessie.” 

“ Mr. Grant love3 you as a younger brother ; let me he your 
sister.” 

“ I don’t doubt Mr. Grant’s love,” he said huskily. “ What 
has that to do with it ? 99 

“ We should both wish to” 

“ Bessie ” — a sudden light flashing on him — “ You’re not 
going to — it’s not Mr. Grant you’re going to marry ? ” 

“ When aunt will let me. Oh ! he our brother, Graham,” 
she said, softly pressing his hand, which still held hers. 

“ I shall go mad ! ” he cried, and tossing her hand from 
him, before she could speak he was out of the room, and she 
heard the outer door shut behind him. She sat still almost 
stupefied, her uppermost thought being — 

“ Oh, if I could suffer for him ; if I could only suffer for 
him ! ” But she couldn’t, and though gifted with a good 
share of imagination, she did not even imgine this suffer- 
ing. Her only measure was, “ If I should lose Mr. Grant ! ” 
But then Mr. Grant was so immeasurably her superior, that 
for Graham to lose her, was not to be mentioned in the same 
breath with her losing Mr. Grant. 

It is difficult for a person in cold blood to realize that he or 
she is of such paramount interest in the eyes of another. All 
at once a glad thrill went through Bessie, when Sara Ander- 
son occurred to her. “ He has got over one disappointment 


BLINDPITS. 


389 


in no very long time, and tlie first must be the worst. He 
will soon get over this.” 

She went to her bedroom, the room she had so long shared 
with her aunt. A trunk was standing open on the floor, and 
Miss Barclay was turning out the contents of drawers, select- 
ing and packing for the projected departure. Bessie sat down 
and looked on. Her aunt’s capacity for attending to all kinds 
of commonplace details, in any circumstances, was a perpetual 
miracle to her. She remembered reading various celebrated 
criminal trials, and she had tried to picture the after-life of the 
people concerned in them, and wondered if they could possi- 
bly subside into ordinary life after being exposed to the 
unmitigated glare of the world’s dark lantern ; if a man could 
go back to his business, and a woman compose herself to her 
seam (in her eye the pitch of domestic virtue) ; if the house- 
hold could live together on the old terms, or if suspicion killed 
kindness. Strangely — and the exceeding strangeness of it 
could never pass away — here she was in the very position she 
had speculated about ; and there was her aunt, to all appear- 
ance, as calmly inspecting underclothing, and stowing it away, 
as if she had not sat for three days in the criminal dock. Bor 
the time Graham Bichardson and even Mr. Grant were driven 
out of her head. If her aunt would have let things go by the 
board ; if she would have lain on a sofa, weeping and reading 
novels alternately; if she w'ould have kindled up into a 
tragedy speech occasionally, Bessie could have borne it ; but 
to see her not only make no ado, but slip quietly into her old 
place ; to see her put everything to rights, and then take her 
post as guardian, and slave of the household ! Nay, in return 
for their father’s kindness, she had asked the Misses Eraser to 
come as usual for music lessons, and there she sat an hour 
every day patiently directing the fat stiff perspiring fingers in 
their very hopeless task. 

She was on her knees in front of the trunk, arranging its 
contents, when suddenly Bessie threw herself down beside 
her. 


390 


BLINDPITS. 


“ 0 auntie ! you are too good — too good ; let me in again. 
"Don’t shut me out of your heart, and take Mr. Grant in too ; 
please, auntie,” she concluded in a low childish tone. Miss 
Barclay did not speak. “ Why should you suspect evil in 
others who are so good yourself? Only to-day Mr. Grant 
was ” 

“Bessie, my dear,” said Miss Barclay, in measured tones, 
“I have already expressed the wish, and I express it again, 
that you will not name that name in my hearing. As for 
shutting you out of my heart, you have been too long there to 
he easily put out, or kept out. It will he your own doing if 
ever that happens.” 

* “ Aunt, you have confidence in Mr. Richardson. I couldn’t 

help telling him about it to-night — not for my own sake, hut 
yours ; and he thought the idea too outrageous to he enter- 
tained for a moment.” 

I “ It was imprudent to speak of it ; let it never he men- 
tioned again.” 

“ I would he guilty of any imprudence if I thought I could 
move you.” 

“ I’ll speak to Graham to-morrow.” 

“ You may not see him to-morrow. I don’t think he’ll he 
here.” 

“Yes; he is to look in to do anything for us. He is a 
young man to whom I never can feel sufficiently grateful.” 

“ 0 aunt ! ” said Bessie, and the words came drearily from 
the bottom of her heart, “I am weary of life. I used to 
wonder at heathens killing themselves. I don’t wonder now. 
Step by step we come to understand things. Surely I haven’t 
much more to learn ! ” 

In former days Miss Barclay would have thrown all the 
strength of her nature into a suitable reply to such a speech 
as this. How she broke down. It was grievous to her that 
the young girl she had so long tried to keep from every blast 
that blew, should have come to such a finding about life 
already. She put an arm round her neck. 


BLIXDPITS. 


391 


“ Darling ! ” she sobbed — “ My darling ! — we have been 
sorely tried.” 

u Aunt, I did not mean to vex you. 0 aunt ! say I am 
wicked ; give me a lecture — anything — but don’t cry.” 

Estrangement between these two was indeed a wretched 
thing. 


CHAPTER LIII. 


The projected journey was never more than projected. 
Mrs. Barclay was not able to leave her bed next day, although 
very anxious to do so. She had an illness which lingered 
long, and even threatened once or twice to be serious. She 
and her faithful henchwoman, Miss Dobbie, were as disap- 
pointed as two children. Miss Barclay and Bessie were 
thankful to stay at home. One evening and another passed, 
and no Graham appeared as usual. 

“ I am surprised Graham has not come yet,” Miss Barclay 
said to Bessie. “ After clinging to us in all our distress, he 
surely won’t fail us now.” 

“ Aunt ! ” said Bessie, and she stopped. 

“ Well?” 

“ I haven’t expected Graham since the last night he was 
here.” 

“ Why not ? ” 

“ Because he went away not very well pleased ; that is, he 
was disappointed because” 

“Because what, Bessie? What could you possibly say? 
I can’t afford to lose Graham Richardson.” 

“ Pm sure I didn’t deserve it, aunt. Looking over things, 
I never did give him grounds to suppose that I/’ 

“ To suppose what ? ” said Miss Barclay anxiously. 

“ He said he loved me, and wanted me to love him. That, 
you know, is impossible,” she said simply. 

“0 Bessie, have you really thrown Graham Richardson 
away? I don’t know, I never knew, his equal” — in the 


BLINDPITS. 


393 


warmtli of her feelings she waxed eloquent — “ and all for the 
sake of a base bad man, who ” 

“ Stop, aunt ; I’ll not hear Mr. Grant spoken of in that 
way” — and all the dignity of a woman came into her 
demeanor. “You may praise Graham — you can’t praise him 
too much ; the other had better not be spoken of between 
us.” 

“ Better not, indeed ! ” Miss Barclay was saying, when Mrs. 
Dods w r as shown into the room. 

“ I cam in to speer for Mrs. Barclay. I hope she is nae 
waur.” 

“ Thank you, Mrs. Dods ; she’s much the same — rather 
better perhaps. Miss Dobbie is with her. I don’t know what 
we should do without her.” 

“Ay,” said Mrs. Dods; “we’re needing a nurse wi’ us the 
now, but I misdoubt she would hardly do, even if ye could 
spare her.” 

“ Who’s ill, Mrs. Dods ? — not Mr. Dods, I hope.” 

“ Ho, he’s gey weel the now, I’m thankful. It’s Mr. Bich- 
ardson, puir callant ! He gaed out late for a walk twa three 
nights syne, and it cam on a heavy shower; but he never 
heeded, and next morning his head was that sair he couldna 
lift it aff the pillow ; and the day the doctor says it’s brain- 
fever.” 

“ Brain-fever ! ” cried Bessie ; “ he’s not seriously ill, is 
he ? ” 

“ That’s to be seen yet, but I hope no.” 

“ Who is with — is there any one with him ? ” asked Miss 
Barclay. 

“ Tammas is noticing him the time I am out. I was think- 
ing o’ writing to Mrs. Bichardson, his step-mother, only I’ve 
aye heard tell o’ her as an unco delicate woman.” 

“ Don’t,” said Miss Barclay ; “ It will afford me no ordinary 
pleasure to be of use to him. He deserves some kindness at 
our hands. I’m thankful for the opportunity.” 

“Weel, if ye think ye’re able, it will be a great ease to my 
17 * 


394 


BLINDPITS. 


mind. I canna do a’thing, an’ to get a stranger into the 
house ye ken naetliing about is a thocht to me.” 

It was all true. Graham had rushed out into the night — I 
was nearly going to say — like the foxes Samson set adrift in 
the fields of the Philistines with burning brands tied to their 
tails. Part of him was certainly on fire, and the open air 
fanned the flame. He strode #long, neither knowing where 
he was going nor the rate at which he was walking. What to 
him was the beauty of the summer twilight, the setting sun, 
the infant moon gleaming from among cloudy swaddling- 
clothes, the tall brick chimneys with their sable plumes, that 
came out with such effect against the sinking sun glowing in 
the west ? Although not generally reckoned picturesque, these 
last were as much to him at that moment as all the host of 
heaven. Nature can’t kill a youthful grief; but when it is 
dead, it can like the robin readbreast, cover it with leaves. 
Graham’s grief was only newly and suddenly come into being, 
and cried lustily, and bade fair for long life. A walk in the 
same twilight may lay the ghost of it in after years, and it 
was not an enemy that had done this thing, but his own best 
familiar friend. How was a sudden downpour of rain to 
attract his attention while he was consumed by such a thought 
as that ? But not even in the midst of such a wild conflict 
as possessed him, did it occur to his mind that Mr. Grant had 
taken any advantage that could be called unfair, far less that 
his continental trip had been a link in the chain of events that 
had lost him his love. This did not occur to him now. It 
happily never occurred to him afterwards. Not that he was a 
simpleton, but his was one of those noble natures that are 
filled with the “ charity that thinketh no evil.” Suspect his 
friend ! the man who had been his friend ; yes, had been ; for 
he could be such no longer. He might bear it, he might learn 
to bear it, at a distance possibly — but all intercourse was over 
between them. Ah ! how in the years he had known her, she 
had crept into his study of imagination, and this was to be 
the end — this! Miss Barclay’s infatuations regarding Mr. 
Grant escaped his memory. It never struck him that with 


BLINDPITS. 


395 


her help he might overturn the marriage, and gain Bessie even 
yet. Only one thought was present to him — he had lost his 
love, and he had lost his friend — surely woe enough to over- 
take a man in one moment of one day ; and the wild flame 
of jealousy shot up every now and then, and threw a fierce 
light on the ruin of his hopes. 

Drenched with rain, he went back through the empty 
streets. His pace had slacked as the first bewildering excite- 
ment passed off. He crawled up the stairs and got to bed, 
and there he tossed without seeing sun or stars for many days. 
Thought and memory equally failed him. The desk at his 
office missed him, and his fellow-clerks also. They had 
always considered him as a youth gifted with a kind of virtue 
rather tightlaced ; but among them he was a favorite, likely 
for that very reason. 

“I say,” said clerk No. 1 to clerk No. 2, “Graham Bich- 
ardson has brain-fever, poor fellow ! — a fact.” 

“ Brain-fever ! ” said No. 2 ; “ I shouldn’t wonder though he 
had fifty brain-fevers. The way he threw himself into that 
murder case might have given a horse a brain-fever, or even a 
donkey.” 

“Well,” said No. 1; “he is a striking instance of virtue 
rewarded, and so am I. I went last night to his lodgings to 
ask for him. I’ve a mind to write out all I saw and heard, 
laying on color of course, and try w r hich of the papers would 
come down most genteelly for the paragraph.” 

“ Come, man, out with it. Did you see Graham ; and how 
is he ? ” 

“When I got to his door it was opened by a queer old man, 
in a coat of many colors, from age. When he knew that I 
was a friend of Graham’s, he took me into a parlor, where he 
insisted, like Hardcastle in the play, on giving me his com- 
pany and opinions ; when out of an inner room there glided 
— whom do you think ? ” 

“ Come ; go on. How am I to know ? ” 

“ There glided the celebrated Miss Barclay. I knew her at 
a glance, for I studied hey fape at the trial. Says sfte, ■ I pre- 


396 


BLINDPITS. 


sume you are one of Mr. Richardson’s friends, kindly come to 
inquire for him. The medical men are very hopeful of him 
now ; hut meantime he is to see no one.’ ” 

“ I gave my name and left ; and as I was going out, said to 
my old man, 1 Is Miss Barclay attending Mr. Richardson ? ’ ” 
u Deed is she,” said he ; “ and a better nurse canna be.” 

“ ‘ No accounting for tastes ! ’ I muttered ; and at that 
moment I saw the head of the thick-skinned boorish preacher 
who was so well raked at the trial — and on whom and the 
servant Armstrong tried to throw suspicion — stuck out at a 
door. Graham is certainly one of a happy family. Upon my 
word, I breathed more freely when I got into the open air 
again.” 

“ Rather he than I have such a nurse. I hope there will 
be no mistake with his food or medicine. It makes one feel 
queer.” 


CHAPTER LIY. 


It was a long time before Graham knew who nursed him, 
although Barbara devoted herself by night and day to him, 
with the honest integrity of her nature, warmed by her lik- 
ing for him, and her sense of gratitude. When he did 
become alive to the fact, he was as weak as an infant, and he 
accepted it without being able to think about it. His room 
was darkened, and Barbara was sitting leaning on the foot of 
his bed, her head bentj and half asleep. 

“ Is it you, Miss Barclay ? ” he said, almost in a whisper. 

She was at his side in an instant. 

“ Yes, Graham.” 

“ I have been ill, haven’t I ? ” 

“ You’ve been seriously ill.” 

“ How long have I been ill ? ” 

“It is three weeks past on Tuesday since you were 
attacked.” 

“ And what day is this ? ” 

“ Thursday ; but don’t speak any more just now.” 

“ I want to know, Miss Barclay — I want to know — is 
Bessie married yet ? ” 

“ Ho,” she said shortly ; and then he turned his face to the 
wall, and she resumed her seat, and the needlework with 
which she beguiled the hours of watching. 

When Graham first got out of bed he was like a ghost. 
He sat on a chair and looked on his hands as if they were 
things that did not belong to him. He said to Barbara, who 
was gently combing his hair — 


BLINDPITS. 


898 

“ Are you not frightened for such, a skeleton ? if a puff of 
wind were to come across me, I think my hones would rattle.” 

“ You are certainly rather thin, hut a short time will obvi- 
ate that ; for the next few weeks you do nothing but eat and 
sleep.” 

“ Has any one been here the time I’ve been ill — to ask for 
me, I mean ? ” 

“ Yes ; there was a young man from your office.” 

“ None else ? ” 

“ Not so far as I am aware.” There was a pause. 

“ Miss Barclay,” he began again, “ has — has Bessie never 
been here ? ” 

“No, but she has been very anxious about you.” 

“ Why should she ? ” he said bitterly. “ Why should any 
one be anxious about me ? If I had died, who would have 
been sorry ? But I have lived, and there is no one to welcome 
me. I have nothing to live for.” 

“Mr. Bichardson,” said Barbara, gently, “I think you do 
wrong in allowing yourself to talk in that strain.” 

“I can’t help it. To lose her is more than I can bear.” 

“ O Graham ” — and she sank on her knees at the side of 
his chair — “ what is your loss to mine ? She came to me a 
little child ; she has been all I ever had to love ; and she is 
lost — more lost to me than if she were in her grave. You, 
when you have shaken off your present weakness, will rise to 
new life and strength, and find other objects to live for ; but 
what have I ? — what can I have ? A woman broken in name 
and spirit. Yet I live, and I have never complained to a 
human being before.” 

There was a rush of feeling to Graham’s heart at this sud- 
den burst, which, in his weakness, nearly choked him. He 
recalled the prison scenes, and the terrible time of the trial. 
He grasped her hands as her head rested on his knee. 

“ Barbara ! ” he said ; “ Barbara, I owe my life to you. If 
it will comfort you, don’t let us separate. Let us comfort each 
other. Be mine — be my wife, I will shield and love you 
while I live.” 


BLINDFITS. 


399 


“ Graham,” she said, rising to her feet in astonishment, 
te you forget me, and you forget yourself.” 

“ No, no,” he said. “ I know there are some j r ears between 
us, if that’s what you mean, hut it will make no difference to 
us ; and I care nothing for other people’s opinions. Besides, 
« I’m old — I feel very old.” 

“ Poor boy ! ” she said, looking at him kindly. “ If I were 
to take advantage of your weakness, you would he repenting 
before this time to-morrow.” 

Barbara was not impulsive, and she was judicious. She 
loved Graham with the love of an elder sister, or a good aunt 
— more even, for she had deeply felt his kindness in the time 
of her sore need ; hut she was not one of those women whose 
whole feelings, at some time of* their lives, are swept into one 
channel, and who are carried away, coute que coute, by the 
rush. Neither did she ever yearn for rest and a lean on a 
stronger nature. Her love for Bessie, having had time and 
opportunity, had become nearly a passion, and had betrayed her 
for the moment into her impulsive utterance to Graham ; hut 
she was not without other sources of satisfaction. She could 
look life in the face, and feel that she had done what in her lay 
to make the best of it, and that she could still do that. In 
fact, her life had been so long one of neutral tints, that she 
almost shrank from bright coloring, as weak eyes from the 
glare of the sun ; and, having little imagination, she had 
never painted dazzling pictures of what life might he in a 
different combination of circumstances. Even in the terrible 
ordeal to which she had been subjected, although she pitied 
herself, she did not, like Bessie, fly against the injustice of 
it, but looked at it as the necessary consequence of the inci- 
dents of the case. 

“ You say,” she continued, “ that you care nothing for the 
opinion of others ; but what others think and say of us goes a 
long way to make our happiness or the reverse. Not that I 
would be the slave of public opinion either ; but we ought not 
to leave it altogether out of our reckonings. People would 
think you mad to marry an old woman who had been tried for 
murder.” 


400 


BLINDPITS. 


“ Miss Barclay ! ” cried Graham. 

“Yes; people would express their opinion in such words as 
these, and you would not like it. We shall always he good 
friends. If in after-life this should recur to your memory, you 
will feel deeply grateful that I happened to he gifted with 
more sense than hqd fallen as yet to your share.” 

Graham hardly knew whether to laugh or cry — most likely 
he did both. With his reasoning powers he had long admired 
Miss Barclay ; and when she had given way to such a strong 
outburst of feeling, he was drawn towards her, and in his 
weakness and desolation he fancied he loved her ; but when 
she relapsed into propriety, the little dark bushy flower tied 
up to a stick came before him, and by the time she got to the 
end of her sensible speech he felt that all she said was wonder- 
fully true, and that in giving vent to his overwrought feelings 
he had made a fool of himself. Commonly, all that Miss 
Barclay said was true, with certainly no admixture of poetry. 
A lady of less common sense than Miss Barclay might have 
thought it necessary to retire from her post of sick-nurse after 
such an interview with her patient ; but she did not, and the 
strong friendship between Graham and her settled itself on a 
more satisfactory and less romantic level. She felt happier 
than she had been since the quiet tenor of her life had been 
so cruelly broken in upon. Nor did Mr. Bods neglect his 
favorite lodger ; whenever Barbara went home, he took her 
place by Graham’s bed, and beguiled his tedium in his own 
way. 

“ Ay,” he would say, “ ye’re a different thing a’thegether 
from what ye were this day-week ; ye’ll soon be on your legs 
again.” 

“ So they say, but I’m as weak as water.” 

“ By-the-by I’ve a message for ye — Mr. Pettigrew has his 
compliments, and could he do anything for ye — sit up a night, 
or the like o’ that ? ” and Mr. Bods gave a low chuckle. 

“ Tell Mr. Pettigrew I’m obliged to him, but there’s nothing 
I need.” 

“ I’ll do nae sic thing ; ye’re no obliged to him, and there’s 
no use telling a lee ; I’ll just say ye dinna want him.” 


BLTNDPITS. 


401 


“ That’s true, certainly,” said Graham, smiling even in his 
weakness. 

“ Ay, it’s true ; onybody wad be ill off for a nurse that took 
him, and ye’re by ordinar’ weel off.” 

“Miss Barclay is infinitely kind,” said Graham, warmly. 

“An’ to think on sic a cloud settling on her life; puir 
thing ! puir thing ! And no only on her, hut the lassie, Bes- 
sie. Do ye ken she was in here this forenoon, looking at ye 
when ye was sleepin’ ? She asked if you were sleepin’ 
before she came in. Your hand was lying outside the claes, 
and she stooped and touched it with her lips, and when she 
looked up again I saw the water in her een. She slipped 
away, and a minute after Mr. Grant came in and stood beside 
ye, and said, ‘ Poor fellow ! poor fellow ! ’ I wanted to waken 
ye, hut he wadna let me.” 

Graham turned his face to the wall, and the tears trickled 
down his cheeks ; as he did not speak, the old man went on — 

“ It was the time Miss Barclay was in with her mother, hut 
she’ll ken mair about Mr. Grant’s visit, and will likely he, 
tellin’ ye.” 

As Graham still did not speak, Mr. Dods took the hint, and 
was silent also, supposing that the patient, soothed by hearing 
of the kindness of his friends, was dropping asleep again, and 
he slid from the room. 

But he had said enough to put Graham, weak as he was, 
into a ferment of thought and feeling. He rose from his bed, 
and, looking in the glass, met his great eyes ; thrice their 
usual size they seemed, because the flesh had all left his face. 
Even the blood appeared to have left it also, so ghastly was it. 
He smiled, and the effect was weird. Staggering back to his 
bed, he looked at his hand, and said, “ She kissed that bunch 
of bones ! strange that I slept on ; such a touch might have 
roused the dead. 0 Bessie ! ” he cried, and with that yearn- 
ing cry he lost consciousness. 

He had a relapse which the doctors and Miss Barclay said 
could not be accounted for. But youth triumphed. Graham 
was not made to die of disappointed love. His nature was far 


402 


BLINDPITS. 


too sound and whole for that ; and when he w r as able, which 
was not till the October of the year, he went awa}’ - from Iron- 
burgh. But, before he left, there recurred to him what Bessie 
had said to him regarding her aunt’s hallucination about Mr 
Grant. At the moment he heard it he dismissed it as 
ridiculous, and he had altogether lost sight of it. Afterwards, 
in his own fight of affliction, he took an opportunity to speak 
of it. 

“ Miss Barclay,” he said, and he colored as he said it, 
" wdien I made the proposal that offended you so much” 

“ dSTo, not offended, Graham. I couldn’t be offended, know- 
ing, as I did, that you meant the truest kindness, mistaken 
though you were.” 

u Mistaken or not, I w^as led on to it by your grief at losing 
Bessie. That was ground common to us both. You said she 
was more lost to you than if she was in her grave ” 

u A thousand times.” 

“ I did not take in the meaning of the words then, but I 
have thought of it since — you object to Mr. Grant?” 

“ Object ? Bessie told you what I believed him to be, 
didn’t she?” 

“ Yes, she did ; but it never laid hold of me. Miss Bar- 
clay, it is an impossibility on the very face of it.” 

“ Graham, the thing was done. I did it or he did it. No 
other creature had the opportunity.” 

“ I’ll sooner believe that you did it, Miss Barclay.” 

“ That may afford satisfaction to your mind,” she said, with 
some bitterness, “ but it does not afford satisfaction to mine.” 

“ He has been my best friend since I was the height of that 
table, and is a man of spotless character. I shouldn’t grudge 
him his happiness in winning Bessie ; but, for the life of me, 
I can’t help it. I grudge it to the verge of madness.” 

“ Yet you would have been content with me ! ” And Bar- 
bara said this, not with the intention of quizzing what, from 
her point of view, she might have thought the young man’s 
heroics, as she might have done if she had had a sense of 
humor, but with a shade of asperity not altogether unnatural. 


BLINDPITS. 


403 


<l Yes, I could — I am sure I could — if you could have "been 
content with me. What remains for me better than content- 
ment, if indeed I reach that ? ” 

Women in this world are somewhat in the position of the 
Englishman in India — if they have patience they are likely to 
lose it ; and if they haven’t, in all probability they will gain 
it. Even this good, generous lad could forget himself, and 
give Barbara an opportunity of increasing her stock of pa- 
tience ; hut her life had been one long opportunity of that kind. 
If Graham had been less truthful, he had been more compli- 
mentary. 

“ I Tvonder, for instance, if, in the nature of things, I can 
ever go to Grantsburn to visit Mr. Grant or Bessie ? ” 

“ Hot Bessie. You’ll never visit Bessie there if I live and 
retain my reason. I’ve told her, and she knows I’ll keep my 
word, that if I can prevent her going there only by exposing 
him to the world, I’ll do it. Hypocrite as he is, it is scarcely 
probable that he’ll risk that.” 

u Miss Barclay, this is incredible ! It is liker insanity than 
anything else. Mr. Grant not risk it ? Why, I would stake 
my life he would come out of any investigation cleaner than 
the driven snow.” 

“ I’ve no wish for revenge ; though it is a hard thing for 
me to lie under such a ban. But if he lets Bessie alone, I’ll 
do nothing. And he is letting her alone. He will wait, she 
says, for my consent.” 

And there came into her face a dark — very dark expression. 
She thought of the mischief done already — Bessie’s youth 
blighted, and the wretched estrangement between them. 

“ Well, Miss Barclay, I’m sorry for you — profoundly sorry. 
You’re making your own unhappiness now. I can do nothing 
for any one, it seems, and I’ll go my way. But at least I 
carry with me a perfect faith in you and Mr. Grant, and that 
is something. It is nearly everything. If I suspected either 
of you, I think I should die even yet. It would not take 
much to knock me hack to w T kere I was.” 

“ I would give all I have, or am ever likely to have, to any 


404 


BLINDPITS. 


one who would prove Mr. Grant’s innocence. Perhaps, if you 
were in my position, you would view matters in a different 
light.” 

As she said this, Graham’s pity for the solitary bereaved 
woman mastered him again. He kissed her hand and said— » 

“ Light will be thrown on it some day, Miss Barclay ; be 
sure of that. Let us live in that hope.” Barbara shook her 
head, and they parted. 

Truly Herod, in collecting all the chief men for slaughter 
when the breath should have left his own body, that he might 
secure mourning in the land, failed in his end ; but Miss 
Boston, who in life desired nothing but the happiness of her 
friends, in death had caused deep and prolonged woe to every 
one she had loved best. Barbara, Bessie, and James Grant, 
the three people to whom her affections had really flowed out, 
found themselves in a labyrinth of ghastly painful mystery, 
out of which there seemed no clue. Mr. Grant, it is true, 
presided at the tenantry dinner, and joked, and laughed, and 
discussed agricultural affairs, as had been his manner; but it 
was remarked that this geniality was not the spontaneous 
thing it had been ; it was thought somewhat forced. He rode 
about on Meg ; but even Meg seemed to have caught the 
infection of care, for she did not show such sprightly bearing 
as had been her wont. Miss Grant, upon whose imagination 
the mysterious death of Miss Boston had laid deep hold, 
brought it up before her brother perpetually. She did not 
believe Miss Barclay guilty, yet did not see her way to her 
innocence ; and she bewailed the calamity on Bessie’s account. 
What will become of her f What will become of her ? was a 
question she asked a hundred times, as if wholly unconscious 
she had asked it before at all. She and the Misses Stark 
turned the matter over every time they met, and that was not 
seldom. Mrs. Ainslie held to her original belief in Barbara’s 
innocence ; but she did not openly become her champion. 
She dropped all allusion to her in Mr. Grant’s presence ; and 
when her sister-in-law said — 

“ Mr. Grant, what has become of that girl, Bessie Barclay, 


BLINDPITS. 


405 


the unfortunate woman’s niece ? ” she pressed Mrs. Peters’ 
toes violently under the table ; and Mrs. Peters called out, who 
was tramping on her foot ? 

In Mr. Grant’s rides he must often pass Blindpits. John 
Simpson’s grandchildren used every liberty in Mis3 Boston’s 
premises. A perpetual washing, not of the most ornamental 
kind, was hung on Miss Boston’s bushes to dry ; and a hoard 
laid on two big stones, by the side of the door, was towards 
evening often occupied by John and his son-in-law, while 
they smoked the calumet of peace. Truly the place that 
knew Miss Boston so long knew her no more. And, on the 
shore-road, he often passed the rock from which he had rescued 
Bessie. If she had been drowned then she could hardly be 
more out of his reach than she was now. No wonder Mr. 
Grant was not quite the jovial man he had been. And Bar- 
bara and Bessie ? — it was much that they had had occupation, 
the one in nursing Graham, and the other attending to her 
grandmamma ; but now Graham was gone, and Mrs. Barclay 
was better ; and once more, with little talk of it, and heavy 
hearts, they began to pack for their journey — Miss Dobbie, 
with her perennial spirit, doing all the pleasure of anticipa- 
tion ; but even she found it hard work. 


CHAPTEE LY. 


Graham was gone. Hitherto all his holidays had been 
spent at Grantsburn. He remembered going there for the 
vacation, and it seemed only yesterday, although it was when he 
was fifteen. He had been made a man of by his stepmother 
sending him a watch. He remembered an elderly man oppo- 
site him in the railway carriage smiling — he didn’t know why 
at the time, hut he knew now, it was at the frequency with 
which he pulled out his watch. Probably the man was think- 
ing then, as he was thinking now, what a grand thing it was to 
he young, to have a watch, to he reading Old Mortality for the 
first time, and to he going home for the holidays. Why, life 
then was all sparkling with bubbles like a glass of champagne. 
He had finished Old Mortality before he went to bed that 
night. He wondered if Cuddy could make him laugh now. 
He fancied he was old; and he • was at least old enough to 
have found out that grief and disappointment do not last, in 
their first bitterness, for ever. It is questionable if at the 
moment, this is a consolation. Hay, is it not a species of 
mockery to think. 

“ How that wljjidh was the life’s life of our being, 

Can pass away, ‘and we recall it thus.” 

But on this journey Graham had company. Mr. Dods had 
volunteered to escort him to 'the place of Mr. Dods’ nativity, to 
see him comfortably settled, and to introduce him to the 
inhabitants. It was a grand occasion for Mr. Dods. He did 
not need to envy the boy away for his holidays. He had his 


BLINDPITS. 


407 


worries, as we all know, and he felt them ; but he had been 
born with an india-rubber temperament, and he belonged to a 
generation who, if they struck deep notes, did not let them 
resound beyond their own bosoms. As a poet, he might have 
been excused for having his fits of melancholy musing, if he 
had had them ; but now that he was fairly out from under 
Mrs. Dods’ eye, and equally rid of Pettigrew and his boots, 
his spirits rose till a school-boy of the present day would have 
seemed decidedly solemn and blase alongside of him. Stories 
that had lain perdu in his memory for many a year crept up 
like daisies from below the winter’s sod at the breath of 
spring ; for, with sorrow be it said, Mrs. Dods was not one of 
those wives who feel it their privilege or their duty to smile 
sweetly and laugh freshly, as if the anecdote in hand had 
burst upon them in the dew of its youth. On the contrary, 
when in the humor, she frightened his reminiscences back into 
their holes, whence they only emerged in the absence of the 
cat. 

The place that Mr. Dods hoped would one day be proud to 
claim him as its own, or rather to contest that claim with 
Ironburgh, was a brisk little country town, lying on a ridge 
among swelling uplands. The district round was cultivated 
like a garden, and dotted with farm-houses and gentlemen’s 
seats, peering out of woods, not patriarchal certainly, but old 
enough to flush into a strange bright beauty under the gaze 
of the October sun. There were cottages on the skirts of the 
village covered with roses still blooming; one of these Gra- 
ham thought might suit him. 

u They look poetical enough, but the poetry is rheumatic. 
I’m going to take ye to rooms up a stair, wi’ windows to the 
street, where ye’ll see a’ that goes on.” 

“ And what will go on ? besides, I care nothing for w T hat 
goes on.” 

u No yet ; but by this day week ye’ll rise frae your dinner 
to look at a noise ; it’s the way here. Walking up the street 
the now, for instance, a hundred een are looking at us, that’s 
fifty folk, a sma’ percentage, and by night everybody’ll ken 
we’re here, and where we cam frae, and what we cam for.” 


408 


BLINDPITS. 


“ I think we had better have gone to some less curious 
place.” 

“ If ye ken sic a place ; hut unless it’s the heart of a city, 

I dinna.” 

Mr. Dods conducted him to the top of the long straggling 
street, through a long dirty close, and up a stair, and they 
were asked by a decent oldish woman into a small room, the 
windows of which did not seem to have been opened for a 
week, while a strong sun beat into it. 

“This is like an oven,” said Graham, sinking on a little 
hard careworn sofa. 

“ Ay,” said Mr. Dods, triumphantly ; “ trust an old baker 
for getting dry warm quarters.” 

“ I’m not particular,” said Graham ; “ hut I must have light 
and air.” 

“ Weel, I’ll pu’ up the blinds, and open a window.” 

“And can I get out to walk without going through that 
close and down that street ? ” 

“ That’s the advantage in the present state of your body ; 
it wadna been gude for ye if ye could hae got slinking out 
without dressing yourself and brushing your coat.” 

Graham thought he was properly punished for being so 
weak as to put himself under his landlord’s care. They 
walked together, more perhaps than Graham was very able 
for ; hut he could not rest, and the weather was magnificent — 
still, bright days, with deep blue skies, and an air pure and 
cool. The year might be dying, but it was dying with infinite 
pluck ; it made Graham partly ashamed of himself. 

“ Tis a fair world after all,” said he to Mr. Dods. 

“ Ay,” said Mr. Dods. “ When I come here out of Iron- 
burgh, it aye looks as if the whole district had been keepit 
under a glass shade since the last time I saw it — it all looks 
so bright and clear.” 

“ It is dazzling after Ironburgh smoke.” 

“ ‘ God made the country, man made the town ’ — you would 
think that might have occurred to onybody as weel as Cowper. 
I whiles wonder, if ever my poems see the light o’ day, what 
sentence in them will pass into the language.” 


BLINDPITS. 


409 


“ It’s hard to say, Mr. Dods ; an author’s not the best judge 
of that.” 

“Weel, I daresay no; a man’s often unconscious of his best 
things.” 

“ Genius often is, hut talent always makes the most of its 
good things, and crows about them like these cocks. By the 
way, why do cocks crow more at this season than any other ? ” 

“ Do they ? Ah ! ye havena the poet’s keen sense of obser- 
vation, Mr. Graham. You’ll maybe mind the verse in my 
• Ode to Spring’ — 

‘ When hushed is labor’s cheerful hum, 

And reapers from the fields all go, 

The silence of the year has come, 

’Tis then the cocks are heard to crow.’ ” 

“ True, most true ; that will perhaps he one verse that may, 
for aught we know, pass into the language ; why shouldn’t it ? 
it reminds me of Shakspeare’s ‘Winter Day.’ I would not 
like to say how often I’ve repeated the lines to myself in 
church : — 

‘ When all aloud the wind doth blow, 

And coughing drowns the parson’s saw, 

And birds sit brooding in the snow, 

And Marian’s nose looks red and raw.’ ” 

“ That’s like the thing,” said Mr. Dods. 

“It is the thing,” said Graham, “full and graphic ; hut you 
poets pack ideas like herrings in a barrel, where we poor mor- 
tals pass and see nothing.” 

“There’s some truth in that. Weel, ye’ll ken next time 
that the cocks dinna craw mair at this season, they’re only 
better heard.” 

“ I’ll never forget it. Then, Mr. Dods r is there anything 
particular about us, that we are so stared at, or is it because 
the people here have nothing else to do — can you tell me ? ” 

“ It’s both, sir. It’s gotten wind that you and me’s gey 
intimate wi’ Miss Barclay. At the time o’ the trial, they tell 
me, five hundred extra papers were sold in this place, and the 
folk are no very busy ; they’re no driven here as they are in 
18 


410 


BLTNDPITS. 


Ironburgh. What tempted the gudewife to gang to Iron- 
burgh is mair than I ken,” and Mr. Dods sighed. 

“ I hate fo he stared at,” said Graham. “Intimate with 
Miss Barclay ! what do they expect to see ? I’ll leave this 
place ; it’s very fine and bracing, and all that, hut I’ll leave, 
Mr. Dods.” 

“You should stay another week at least; ye’re looking a 
different thing already.” 

“ I am different. I’ll go to my stepmother ; I’ll not frighten 
her now. I’ll leave with you to-morrow, Mr Dods.” 

“ Weel, weel ! we’ve had an uncommon pleasant week, and 
ye may he the better Gf another change,” and Mr. Dods 
sighed. His holiday was over. They travelled so far 
together, hut Mr. Dods’ spirits had somewhat flagged ; his 
stories, after having played about for a week, were creeping 
hack to their hiding-places, and he was resuming the taciturn 
subordinate part of Mrs. Dods’ husband. 

Graham, who had shrunk at first from going to his step- 
mother, because she was Mr. Grant’s sister, and he might meet 
him there, and because, being a delicate woman, he did not 
wish to shock her by his grim gaunt appearance, went to her 
now, and was much made of. As the old rhyme has it, he 
wanted three things — “ sleep, meat, and makin’ o’ ” — a glori- 
ous combination to a worn-out body and mind; and he got 
them, made fragrant by a gentle sense of home stealing all 
round him. All the influences were soothing. Mrs. Richard- 
son had, like everybody, heard of the Barclay trial, but it had 
passed from her thoughts like other nine-days’ wonders, and 
she did not speak of it. Bessie Barclay’s name she had heard 
from her sister, but she knew neither of the interest her 
brother nor her stepson had in her. Had she known there is 
little doubt she would have tried to lead Graham to the 
dangerous subject, but it was safe from her handling, and he 
was thankful. Several times she spoke of her brother, but 
the topic not being taken up with customary frankness, she 
said at last — 

“ Graham, is there any disagreement between you and your 
uncle ? ” 


BLINDPITS. 


411 


“ None.” 

“ Are you going to Grantsburn before you go back to Iron- 
burgh ? ” 

“ Pm not going back to Ironburgh. Pm tired of it, and I 
mean to learn German. I’ll go to the Continent for a while.” 

“ Is German of much use to a factor ? ” 

“ It may be, but it is of use to a man. There are many 
German books I want to read.” 

“ Does your uncle know of this plan ? ” 

“No ; I suppose I’m old enough to plan for myself,” and he 
laughed a little bitter laugh. 

Mrs. Richardson could not make it out. 

“ I think you should ask his advice though.” 

“ Perhaps I should ; if I were a dutiful nephew I would. I 
have written to Ironburgh for some letters of introduction. I 
mean, if I can get it, to take a situation in Hamburg. I can’t 
afford to be idle, you know.” 

“ The notion is sudden, surely.” 

“ Of going to Hamburg ? well, perhaps, but I have long 
thought of leaving the country.” 

“ Why should you leave the country ? ” 

“ Why should I stay in it ? ” 

“ Graham ! ” said she, reproachfully. 

“ You think I’m ungrateful, dear mamma. I’m not un- 
grateful, I’m only restless ; just let me go quietly, and I’ll 
come back in time.” 

“ In time for what ? ” said Mrs. Richardson, simply. 

“Oh, I didn’t mean in time for anything. I daresay 
nothing will go out of joint owing to my absence.” 

“Well,” said Mrs. Richardson with a sigh, “if you were 
my own son, Graham, I don’t know that I could feel more in- 
terest in you, but I can’t expect to tie you to my apron- 
string.” 

“ If you could, mamma, you would be eager to get me un- 
tied again. I doubt I’m what Mrs. Dods would call a restless 
pennyworth.” That day Mrs. Richardson wrote to her 
brother, asking to know what was the breach between him 
and Graham, relating the Hamburg plan, and generally giving 


412 


BLINDPITS. 


vent to her anxiety regarding her step-son and his affairs. It 
was not without a pang that Mr. Grant read this letter, hut 
he answered there was no breach between him and Graham — 
there was a reason, which he expected would blow over, why 
Graham did not feel so cordially to him ; that he approved of 
his going to Hamburg, and that the likelihood was he would 
he hack before he was too perfect in the language. 


CHAPTER LVL 


Graham did not go back to Berwick Street ; be was burn- 
ing the boats of his memory behind him. He bade Miss 
Barclay good-bye in a very tender, humble note. He asked 
her to forgive him for wounding her feelings, as he was afraid 
he had done ; his only excuse was his own mad selfishness at 
the moment. Would she write to him now and then ? and 
would she bid other friends good-bye for him? The words 
were few and simple, but they carried comfort to Barbara’s 
heart ; would have done so, even if she had not found herself 
despised and forsaken, except by the very few. Eor the suspi- 
cion of her crime in many minds, and the certainty of it in more, 
hung over her like a shadow, deeper almost than the shadow 
of death, and there seemed to be no emerging from it ; and it 
now began to tell on her health and spirits as it never had 
done hitherto. She must make an effort, and feeling unequal 
to pioneering her household in a strange land, among people 
with a strange language, her mother agreed to go to a Devon- 
shire village Miss Dobbie often spoke of with enthusiasm, she 
having seen it one summer day in her youth. Thither accord- 
ingly they betook themselves, towards the end of the gloomi- 
est November that had ever yet been for them. But Miss 
Barclay revived. It seemed in this remote place as if she had 
got out from under the curse of Cain. Whether it was that 
the people had never heard of her and her trial, or, having 
heard, had forgotten it as a thing of no interest to them, 
certain it was that here she walked out, and met with friendly 
greeting from the few passers by. At first it moved her so 


414 


BLINDPITS. 


that she sat down on a stone and burst into tears of pity and 
thankfulness. Hers was a hard lot, surely it was a hard lot ! 
and here they were far from Mr. Grant. But many a letter 
passed between Bessie and him, unknown to. Miss Barclay. 
Bessie arranged it so, to spare her aunt’s feelings. She was 
above a clandestine action ; hut having promised never to 
marry Mr. Grant without her aunt’s consent, she felt she had 
done all that — and a great deal more than — was reasonable, 
and that which she would not ’have done had the circumstances 
been ordinary. The winter was a mild one ; and the many 
winding lanes were filled with spring-flowers as if by magic, 
and in wandering about together Miss Barclay and her niece 
almost resumed the old relations. If the past could only have 
been all annihilated — blotted out ; if they had never seen Mr. 
Grant ; if only the fatal summons to Miss Boston, that had 
come two short years ago, had never been sent, or had not been 

complied with ; if — if — if So thought Barbara ; hut there 

it was, all fixed as in the hook of fate. 

Mr. Grant always wrote cheerfully and hopefully to Bessie, 
hut he was far from feeling cheerful and hopeful. Her letters 
came to him so simple, so pure, so natural, and so loving, that 
it seemed always as if a delicious draught were held to his 
thirsty lips, and yet he was never to taste it. He loved the 
child as he had never loved a human being, and yet he was 
separated from her. Child as she was, she had taken her 
stand, and no persuasion of his — if he could have brought 
himself to persuade her to leave her aunt — no persuasion of 
his could have induced her to do it. 

A year and a half had elapsed since Miss Boston’s death, 
and still the mystery hung dark as ever, and in all likelihood 
would take its place among the ghastly stories of the country. 
He had even found that one of his servants took a round of 
half-a-mile in going a message, rather than pass Blindpits 
after dark. It bade fair that his fate and Bessie’s was to he 
that they should creep farther and farther into the deep, dark 
shadow. He, like Miss Barclay, was driven up to wish that 
Dr. M’Vicar had never written that note — that the intercourse 
which had lapsed for so many years had never been renewed. 


BLINDPITS. 


415 


It was a bleak day in April, with an east wind that put 
white curly wigs on the heads of the waves racing to the 
shore, occasional sunshine without warmth, and a rattle of 
hail shot from a black cloud, every now and then. Heatlier- 
bugh was not famous for a genial climate or early springs. 
Mr. Grant had been riding fast, but Meg had slackened pace, 
and was walking leisurely along the road that passed Blind- 
pits. If as was said, Miss Boston’s ghost haunted it, did that 
ghost recognize John Simpson ? and if so, how did it feel ? 
Was it aware of the shaggy dirty children that swarmed in 
her premises ? of the squalid washing that held possession of 
her bushes by day and by night ? or of the smell of fierce 
tobacco that ascended on the evening air, and penetrated even 
to the late lady’s chamber. The ghost must have been a very 
mild, diluted, strained edition of the deceased, if, conscious of 
all these things, it made no sign. The rags and the tobacco 
were of themselves enough to have put Miss Boston’s ghost 
distraught. 

But John and his descendants were ghost-proof as long as 
they sat rent-free. Mr. Grant gazed at the house as he 
passed, and he could have believed that the whole dark history 
was a dream. Meg had been so long accustomed to stop at 
the gate that even yet she needed a hint to make her pass it. 
And this old house was the casket that had held the jewel he 
had tined almost without hope of ever finding again ! Look- 
ing at the windows, he could fancy he saw his old friend watch- 
ing his coming, the strongly marked aged face peering out of 
her cap — a peculiar cap, always the same, and made after her 
own design ; the familiar voice, ready to hail him, also after 
her own fashion. But no; Miss Boston had passed away; 
and she, and such as she, have no successors. They belong to 
a condition of things nearly as strange to the present genera- 
tion as if they had lived before the flood. Slowly and 
musingly Mr. Grant passed by. 

He was at some distance when he heard his name shouted 
excitedly, and looking round, he saw Hr. MWicar at the gate, 
waving his hat, and continuing to shout, “ Grant — Grant — - 
Grant, I say.” 


416 


BLINDPITS. 


Mr. Grant turned Meg, and was beside him in an instant. 

“ What is it, doctor ? What’s the matter ? ” 

“ Matter ? the child’s dying,” he said in a kind of joyous 
excitement. “They were too late of sending; nothing can 
save her — nothing.” 

“Whose child?” said Mr. Grant, looking at the doctor’s 
face in bewilderment. How could a child’s death be the cause 
of the doctor’s beaming face ? 

“Well, it’s hard for them, no doubt — Simpson’s grandchild; 
but there will be proof, full proof. I always said it would 
come out. I never believed it. She’s poisoned, poisoned with 
arsenic, and we’ll get to the bottom of it.” 

The ashy hue came into Mr. Grant’s face and overspread it. 
He leaned on the wall. 

“ Goodness ! ” said Hr. M’Vicar. “ Grant, you have not 
heart disease, have you ? Are you going to faint ? ” 

“ Hot that I know of,” said Mr. Grant, slowly. “ Will this 
throw light on Miss Boston’s death ? ” 

“ Every light, all the light we need. Hot a doubt of it ; 
the child has been poisoned accidently with arsenic, so was 
Miss Boston ; and we’ll find out how. It’s very sad about the 
child, of course ; but the suffering will soon be over, and the 
proof will be complete. Come in and we’ll talk it over.” 

“ John,” cried the doctor, in the brisk voice of authority, 
“ take Mr. Grant’s horse round to the stable.” 

The old man appeared with a red cowl on his head, and a 
pipe in his mouth, and led Meg to the familiar stall. 

“ How ! ” and the doctor led the way into the kitchen. 

The child was lying on a bed in a small closet, moaning out 
its life. The chronic washing had been going on earlier in the 
day ; the tub was standing on a turned-up chair with dirty 
clothes soaking in dirty suds ; the place was in disorder. The 
mother, with her gown turned up, and wet apron, and sodden 
hands, was hanging over the child, crying — 

“ Jeanie, my ain wee Jeanie ! 0 Jeanie, Jeanie ! ” 

“ Come, my good woman,” said the doctor, “ tell Mr. Grant 
how it happened. As a Justice of the Peace you had better 
hear it from her own lips,” he said to Mr. Grant. 


BLINDPITS. 


417 


" Doctor ! ” cried the woman, grasping his arm, u can 
naething he done ; naething mair ? Oh, save my bairn ! ” 

“ I ? ve done all that can he done. If I had been sent for 
sooner ” 

u Dinna say it — dinna say that ! I’ve killed my bairn ! I 
was thrang, and no noticing what they were doing. 0 doctor, 
try something else ! ” 

u How often have I told you that nothing more can he 
done ? ” said the doctor, somewhat sharply. 

11 May he if she were raised up she would he easier,” said 
Mr. Grant ; and he went to the bed, and lifted the child gently 
in his arms. 

“ 0 sir, do you think she’s deein’ ? I thought it was just 
some hit common colic.” 

“Poor little thing ! I don’t think she is suffering much 
now,” said Mr. Grant. 

“ Ho,” said Dr. M’Vicar ; “ you may lay her down ; she’s 
dead.” 

The mother gave a mournful cry, and sank on a chair. 

“ Come,” said the doctor ; “ we’ve all to submit, you know, 
and you have plenty of mouths to fill, I’m sure.” 

The woman did not speak ; likely she did not hear this con- 
solatory view of her case, which grated on Mr. Grant’s ears. 

“ Doctor,” he said, when they had gone to the parlor, “ that 
poor woman is in great distress ; you might have had more 
patience with her.” 

“ True,” said the doctor, “ hut I’m so often badgered with 
ignorant, unreasonable, irrational creatures, that I’ve learned 
to take the shortest cut. Job never was medical adviser to 
the poor of three parishes. Satan should have given him that 
post. They’re always sending when there’s nothing the mat- 
ter, and when it’s anything serious, of course we never hear 
of it till it is too late. We’ll have a post-mortem examin- 
ation as soon as possible.” 

“ How did she get arsenic ? ” 

“ That’s it ! ” said the doctor triumphantly. “ The child 
had been in that closet where they keep their pots and pans, 
13 * 


41S 


BLINDPITS. 


and got on the floor something she thought was a sweetie. 
She ate it, and found other two which she did not eat, and 
there they are j ” and he put on the table two small hits of a 
white substance half the size of a pea, which looked like 
minute pebbles. They were granulated arsenic. 

u Now,” he said, “ there’s a clue ; let us follow it up.” 

u It may lead to something, but all it proves is that there’s 
arsenic in the house,” said Mr. Grant. 

“ And has been, I suspect, for many years,” said the doc- 
tor. “ Since I came, the child’s father tells me that an old 
servant of Miss Boston’s, a man who was a shepherd with 
her, told him this forenoon that they used to have arsenic, 
which they employed in a sheep-wash, and it lay on the 
highest shelf in that closet. Of course it was put away years 
ago, but some of it must have got between the shelf and the 
wall and fallen down ; that’s the only way to account for it. 
No such thing as arsenic has been ever purchased by Simpson 
or any of his family.” 

“ Supposing it was in the house, how did it get into Miss 
Boston’s soup ? ” 

“ That’s exactly what we have to find out. I’m going to 
see the woman Bogle immediately. I’ll bring something out 
of her, I don’t doubt.” 

“ Who is she ? ” 

“ Why, Bell. You know Bell, Miss Boston’s servant. She 
married the ploughman at Mossbank more than a year ago. 
She hasn’t been very well. I saw her yesterday, and she’ll be 
none the worse of another visit.” 

“ I wish I could be as sanguine as you, doctor ; but so much 
hangs on it. W T hat do you expect to bring out of her ? Let 
us understand what you mean to do ? ” 

“ I want to bring out that some of that arsenic that used to 
be on the shelf got into Miss Boston’s soup by accident. I 
always believed it was accident.” 

“ I’ve always tried to believe that,” said Mr. Grant, 
musingly. “ I’ve always believed Miss Barclay innocent ; but 
if Bell let arsenic into the soup by accident, would she not 


BLI3TDPTTS 419 

have told, or, at least, would it not have come out, so thor- 
oughly sifted as the evidence was ? ” 

“ Do you think we should let it alone ? ” said the doctor 
sharply. 

“ No, certainly not ; but I’m afraid to hope. Come, I’ll go 
with you to Mossbank. If this should clear up the mystery, 
I’m afraid I shall hardly mourn that child’s death.” 

“ What will your son say, Mr. Grant ? what will your son 
say?” And the doctor rubbed his hands almost in glee, as 
he anticipated the triumph he should have over his son-in-law, 
who plumed himself so highly on his sharp insight and saga- 
city. 

They walked on without speaking. Bell hailed the doctor 
without much ceremony, her thoughts being — “ The body, he’s 
gaun to mak’ a job o’ me ! ” She said to Mr. Grant — 

“ It’s sae lang since I’ve seen ye, sir ; ye bring the auld 
mistress to my mind. Sic a business as that was ! — to think 
that wi’ a’ her spunk she was sent off the world before her 
time.” 

“Mr. Grant and I were just speaking of it as we came 
along. Miss Barclay has left Ironburgh at last ; no wonder.” 

“ But it’s hard on her,” said Bell. “ I canna say I like 
her. She was ane o’ your awfu’ gude folk, that hae nae sym- 
pathy wi’ onyt.hing short o’ perfection. The auld mistress 
was worth a dizzen o’ her ; but I’m sure she never committed 
murder. I never thoclit it, an’ I dinna think it yet.” 

“ Then what did you think, Bell ? ” said the doctor eagerly. 
“You must have some reason for not thinking it.” 

“ Weel, nane in particular, except that I didna think it.” 

“ But did your mind never suggest any explanation ? ” 

“ Weel, I’ve whiles wondered if Miss Boston didna tak’ it 
hersel’ — that’s in a mistake, ye ken.” 

The doctor shook his head. 

“ By-the-by,” he said, “ that’s a sad death at Blindpits just 
now.” 

“ No auld John Simpson ? I didna hear o’t.” 

“ No ; one or his grandchildren, after a few fours’ illness.” 

^ What was the matter, doctor? 


420 


BLLSTDPITS. 


a She was poisoned with arsenic just as Miss Boston was.” 

t( Preserve me ! ” cried Bell, “ the place is no canny.’ ” 

“ It looks like it ; hut this was an accident. Do you not 
think it possible that Miss Boston’s death was accidental ? ” 

“ Yes ; I’ve said I thought she took it hersel’ by mistake.” 

Mr. Grant had left all the speaking to the doctor, and 
employed himself watching Bell’s face, but if she really knew 
anything her looks did not betray her. 

“ I would give much,” said he, u to get at the truth about 
it, for it has not come to light yet, I’m certain. Arsenic was 
kept in that kitchen closet years ago. It seems the child got 
grains of it on the floor, swallowed them and died. How is it 
not possible that some of that arsenic got into Miss Boston’s 
soup by accident ? ” 

Bell’s eyes flashed up. u Do you mean, Mr. Grant, that I 
had ony hand in it, accident or no accident ? I ken naething 
of it — naething, if I should never draw anither breath.” 

“ The boy Davie, you know ? I suppose he never inter- 
meddled with the pots or pans,” said the doctor. 

“ Weel, he whiles made his parritch if I was thrang ; but 
he’s to be here in this house the night, on his road to a fine 
place about Eastburgh that he’s gotten. If ye wad like to 
backspeer him, I’ll send him to ye in the morning, or to Mr. 
Grant ; ony way ye like.” 

“|I would like to see him,” said the doctor. “ Ay, he’s got a 
good place, has he ? You’ll not know the name of the people 
he’s going to.” 

“ Ho ; but he’s to be groom, wi’ a laddie under him. A 
free house, wi’ coals, and gas, and 25s. a-week. My word ! I 
was telling Geordie haudin’ the pleugli was a puir business 
beside it. An’ Davie’s hardly twenty ; but he’s been brushed 
up for a year at the castle.” 

“ Well, Mrs. Bogle, mind flannel on the chest, as I was tell- 
ing you yesterday. Take care of yourself ; an ounce of care 
is worth a pound of drugs.” 

“ Whisht, whisht, doctor ! it’s no for you to say that,” and 
with a cordial laugh the doctor left Mrs. Bogle. 


BLINDPITS. 


421 


“ Mr. Grant said — “ Send David to me to-morrow at ten 
o’clock.” 

“ My word ! he’ll no be ill to send. There was naething he 
used to like better than the chance o’ haudin’ your horse.” 

“ W e’ve not made much of that, doctor,” said Mr. Grant, as 
they walked away again. 

“ Patience, patience, patience ! ” said the doctor. “ I’m ac- 
customed to wait for results.” 

“ Wait ! I’m sick of waiting.” 

“ I’m not,” said the doctor. “ I’ve more at stake than you. 
You want Miss Barclay cleared. I want myself cleared of 
having been imposed upon by as decent-looking a woman as 
ever lived. What will John say when he’s proved in the 
wrong ? He’ll walk a little more softly in future.” And the 
doctor chuckled. 

11 1 would give all Miss Boston’s money twice told to have 
him proved in the wrong ; not exactly to teach him wisdom, 
however,” said Mr. Grant. 

David was somewhat late in arriving at Mosshank. He 
had walked twenty miles from the place to which his father 
and stepmother had removed recently ; and then he had paid 
a visit to Ashburn Cottage, not to the Misses Stark, hut to the 
rare and radiant maiden whom the Misses Stark named Betsy, 
of whose services, through David’s wiles, they were ere long to 
he deprived. 

After exchanging all the news, and hearing his old friend 
Bell ramble on about everything in a kind of excited way, 
which made him winder if she had begun to drink, he and 
his hosts retired for the night. Being out of his tranquil 
ordinary mood, and possessed with the thoughts of the Misses 
Stark’s treasure, he could not sleep ; and he found himself, 
whether he liked or not, in the position of a listener to the 
conjugal talk of Mr. and Mrs. Bogle, being divided from them 
by only a wooden partition. But hearing what fixed his 
attention, he listened with all his might. 

11 1 say, Geordie, I canna sleep, and I maun speak.” 

“Weel, speak.” 


422 


BLINDPITS. 


“ M’Vicar was here to-day, and Grant the factor.” 

“Ye’ve tellt us that often eneuch.” 

“ But I havena tellt ye what they were here about.” 

“ Was’t onything particular ? ” 

“ They wanted to mak’ out that I poisoned Miss Boston by 
accident ; and, Geordie,. I did do it.” 

“The woman’s in a creel ! ” 

“ They spoke o’ the bairn getting arsenic in the closet. I 
was cleaning out the closet that day, as I weel mind; and I 
was standing on a table setting the things on the shelf again, 
when my hand cam’ on what I thought was some wee chucky 
stanes. I stood playing wi’ them in my hand, and havering 
to Peter Pettigrew, and threw ane o’ them to the fire-place. 
The pan wi’ the mistress’s heef-tea was on the fire, and I saw it 
fa’ into it. I put the rest on the shelf, and I was just steppin’ 
down to take it out o’ the pan, when Miss Barclay came to the 
kitchen, and I thought nae mair o’t till the hullabulloo got 
up, and I minded then. I gaed to the shelf, and got the three 
hits o’ white things lying where I left them ; and to put 
mysel’ out o’ doubt, I gied them to twa o’ the hens, and the 
beasts baith died.” 

“ What way did ye no tell at the time ? ” said Geordie, 
sternly. 

“ I was in mortal fear ; but I wad hae tellt if Miss Bar- 
clay had been condemned. I thought they might no believe 
I did it by chance ; and I thocht, Geordie, that ye wad leave 
me;” and Bell clinched her argument with a sob. 

“ Woman ! ye should hae tellt at a’ risks,” said the softened 
Geordie. 

“It’s easy speakin’. They might no hae believed that I 
did it by chance. But it’s lain on my conscience, and I but 
to tell ye. I couldna keep it ony langer.” 

“ W eel, a’ that ye can do now is to gang before a magis- 
trate, and mak’ a clean breast o’t, so far as I can see.” 

“I wonder to hear ye speak. Do ye think I’m gaun to 
mak’ mysel’ a speak in the country after the hale thing’s 
blawn ower? What sense would there be in kicking up 
anither dust about it ? ” 


BLIXDPITS.. 


423 


“ Bell, Bell, hae ye nae pity on the puir leddy that’s lost 
her gude name ? ” 

“ The like o’ her is better able to stand it than me, Geordie ; 
and, forbye, the warst o’t’s ower.” 

And they went on arguing the point — Bell using all femin- 
ine wiles to induce her lord to keep silence, and he giving in 
so far as to promise he would take time to think of it. It 
might have been thought that an honest man like Bogle 
would have been disgusted on discovering his wife’s duplicity ; 
but, given an ordinary man with an averagely smart woman 
as his wife, and he will see all objects as dexterously manipu- 
lated by her. The secret, however, had passed beyond their 
keeping. David did not intend to divulge it though, he would 
leave that to Bogle ; having shared their hospitality, he could 
not go directly and repeat what he was now sorry he had 
overheard. But he went to keep his appointment with Mr. 
Grant, and it was a dangerous freight for a simple youth to 
carry with him into the presence of Mr. Grant and the doctor, 
who was also in waiting to receive him. Accordingly, not a 
very fierce fire of cross-questioning brought the whole thing 
. out. 

That day the two men went at the dinner-hour, and got 
Bogle and his wife together, and without saying anything of 
David’s information, they drew forth the confession. Had 
Bell been alone, she would have brazened it out ; but George 
was not her equal in histrionic powers ; even if he had been a 
rogue, instead of an honest man, he would probably have be- 
trayed her and himself. 

Each left the house with a written copy of Bell’s confession, 
signed by her, in his pocket. Dr. M’Vicar rode home in high 
glee. He called nearly everywhere spreading the news, and 
everywhere he repeated — “ I always knew it, few faces deceive 
me.” But his crowning triumph was when he confronted his 
son-in-law and partner. 

Mary said — “ Papa, that’s the best news you have brought 
us for many a day ; how comforting it is to find that no one is 
guilty, least of all Miss Barclay ! It shook one’s faith in 


424 


BLINDPITS. 


human nature so horribly. Poor Miss Boston ! to think she 
was the victim of an accident after all.” 

John, who had been listening to the doctor’s triumphant 
detail in the coolest silence, said— “ Don’t make too sure of 
that, Mary ; how many people claimed to be Ridley’s mur- 
derer (a notorious crime that had taken place some months 
before) ; the fact is, I believe Bell’s nerves have been shaken, 
and the thing has preyed on her to such a pitch that she 
fancies she did it. Doctor, I suspect you have come on a 
mare’s nest.” 

“ Dr. MWicar was highly exasperated. 

“ Oh, I hope not, John,” said Mary. “ I do hope papa is 
right ; it looks such a natural explanation, too.” 

“Yes, Pm right, Mary.; John may go and examine the 
mare’s nest for himself; it will stand examination, I promise 
him. Mr. Grant and I have taken steps to have the whole 
thing legally sifted, and have the truth established beyond a 
cavil.” 

“ My father must have a good deal of leisure on his hands 
just now.” 

“ 0 John, do you not think it would be a blessed thing to 
be sure that every one is innocent of a cold-blooded, horrible 
crime ? ” said Mary. 

“ Oh, of course, when it can be done ; but what was Bell 
Bogle’s word worth even when she had all her senses, which 
she seems to have lost ? ” 

“ She has all her senses, John, and did not intend to make 
her confession public, but circumstances were too many for her ; 
and we don’t depend on her word alone ; there are corrobora- 
tive incidents we know of, and more will come out. Depend 
upon it, we’ll clear Miss Barclay and our own doors of a cruel, 
unnatural crime ; and I knew we would some time — I always 
knew it.” 

“ It will take a good many corroborative incidents to con- 
vince me and the public of the woman’s innocence,” said the 
younger doctor, drily. 

“Well, you’ll get them — you’ll get them.” 

“We’ll see; credulity is not the vice of the age.” 


CHAPTER LVII. 


Me. Grant went liome, and enclosed his copy of the con- 
fession to Miss Barclay, with a brief note ; he said — 

“ Dear Miss Barclay — Dr. M’Vicar has the great satis- 
faction of finding the clue to the mystery of Miss Boston’s 
death. He and I went to Mrs. Bogle to-day, and I send you 
her confession, signed by herself. The explanation seems so 
simple, we ought to have thought of it sooner. The doctor 
and I will take the necessary steps in the matter. In case 
any of your friends, on such an occasion, should wish your 
photograph, there is a large impression lying in my office here, 
which I succeeded in arresting before they were sown broad- 
cast in all the print-shops. Bell professes great penitence; 
she had need. — I am always sincerely yours, 

James Grant.” 

In the remote Devonshire village, it has been said the Bar- 
clays seemed to have got out from under the heavy cloud, hut 
it had gathered again. In walking one afternoon, the few 
people they had met had passed silently, and turned to gaze 
on them. One child Miss Barclay had been accustomed to 
speak to ran off in an unaccountable and frightened way — un- 
accountable, except by supposing that the fatal story had got 
wind even here. And so it was. JSTone of them remarked on 
these circumstances to the other, but they sat in silence in 
these pleasant rooms, except for the chirrup of Miss Dobbie, 
which, since the dark days, had often seemed painfully out of 
place. At length Mrs. Barclay broke the silence ; she said — • 


426 


BLINDPITS. 


“ Why should we suffer longer ? let us change our name ; 
then we would he secure.” 

“ Yes,” said Miss Dobbie ; “ I would take the name too, 
that would make us doubly secure, and we could choose a 
pretty name when we are choosing ; I never liked Dobbie, 
Barclay is better. Devereux or Tollemache, or any distin- 
guished name out of the peerage.” 

“I wouldn’t,”. said Bessie, her eyes flashing; “I wouldn’t 
give in, it would be as good as confessing our guilt. We’ll 
brave it out and live it down.” 

Barbara smiled sadly, and Mrs. Barclay shook her head and 
sighed. 

“ It’s all very well, Bessie,” said Miss Dobbie, “ for you, 
who are young and brave ; but we, who have been shaken by 
the storms of life so often, must feel that if a little comfort 
could be got by such simple means as changing our names, 
we ought to do it.” 

11 Comfort ! I despise it on such terms.” 

“ Perhaps the feeling does you honor, my dear ; but we, 
who are past our first jeunesse, find it hard to be pointed at 
with the finger of scorn.” 

Just then the little maid who waited on them came into the 
room, and handed a letter to Miss Barclay. There was a 
mingling of fear, and pity, and curiosity in the girl’s face as 
she did so, wholly unlike any expression she had worn before. 
Each of the lodgers saw it for herself, and winced again in 
silence. Glancing at the back of the letter, Bessie knew Mr. 
Grant’s writing at once, and she trembled for the effect it 
might have on her aunt. If she had got it first she would 
have suppressed it. Could he not have sent it to her, and lefft 
her to give it at the happy hour, and not when she was 
wounded and bleeding ? She watched her, and saw the blood 
rush in a flood to her face, and recede as suddenly, then she 
smiled. She held out the letter : “ Bead,” she said, and 
rising she left the room. Bessie snatched the letter; she 
jumped up. 

" Grandmamma, grandmamma, aunt’s cleared ! ” 


BLINDPITS. 


427 


(< And who did it ? ” 

“Bell; Bell, by accident. What should be done to that 
woman for making us wade through such a sea of anguish ? ” 

Grandmamma, with trembling hands, was fumbling out her 
spectacles. “Where’s Barbara? where’s she gone ? read the 
thing, Bessie ? I thought it was some new horror.” 

“ The substance is that Bell did it by accident, and aunt is 
as clear as noonday. See, Miss Dobbie, read it to grand- 
mamma ; I must find aunt.” 

She rushed to her aunt’s room. 

“ Aunt, are you not awfully happy ? ” 

“ No, Bessie, not awfully happy. I am deeply thankful ; 
hut though wounds heal, the scars remain. Can I forget that 
most of the people who knew me believed me capable of mur- 
dering an old helpless woman in her bed ? ” 

“ But the evidence, aunt ; think of the evidence. I must 
say, ever since, when we’ve been at meals, I have allowed you 
to begin first, in case, you know, there should have been any- 
thing extra, you know, in the food.” 

“ Bessie, your joke is ill-timed.” 

“Without a joke, auntie, I don’t wonder at people believing 
it.” 

“ People that knew me ! My whole life gave it the lie,” 
said Barbara, with slightly hitter emphasis. 

“ Auntie,” said Bessie softly, “ I know a person whom you 
believed to he guilty, without any very conclusive evidence.” 

The blood rushed again to Barbara’s face. 

“ I regret it, Bessie — I deeply regret it ; hut it appeared to 
me so self-evident. Mr. Grant, it seems, has done me a ser- 
vice I was not aware of. He will not find me ungrateful, I 
trust.” 

Her voice faltered in the very least. 

“You’ll let me marry him now ? ” Bessie whispered. 

“ I still think him too old for you, my darling.” 

“ It’s not he who is too old, ’tis I who am too young. It 
can’t be helped. But we must go beside grandmamma, and I 
must write. What should he done to that creature Bell ? If 
she could comprehend the torture she has put us to ! ” 


428 


BLINDPITS. 


e( She is quite incapable of arriving at even a distant 
approximation to my feelings in the situation her base conduct 
placed me in.” 

The four ladies for once all agreed that the sooner they got 
back to Berwick Street the better, and the very next morning 
saw them en route for home. 


CHAPTER LVI1I. 


Yet a little while and Graham, going home from his office 
in Hamburg to his lodgings, found this letter lying for him : 

“ Dear Mr. Richardson — I know you will be right glad 
to hear the news, the glorious news, I have to tell. The 
mystery is cleared up, and aunt vindicated to the world. I 
float in air. Aunt takes it quietly, as you will suppose ; but 
she feels it deeply for all that. When she thought I was 
sleeping, I heard her sobbing in the night. I don’t go into 
particulars ; you’ll see them in the newspapers. Aunt has 
seen Mr. Grant. Perhaps we were plunged into all that 
misery to make our happiness more thoroughly exquisite ; but 
I am too happy to speculate. When are you coming back ? 
We should all be glad to see you. — I am, yours most sin- 
cerely, “ Bessie Barclay.” 

This selfishly innocent note made Graham wince in bitter 
anger. If she had not written, or if in writing she had done 
anything but pick him up on the old terms, ignoring his feel- 
ings altogether when her own happiness overflowed ; but his 
love was too true to let that mood continue. “ She can’t 
know,” he said, “ how can she know, what she has cost me. 
It is I who am selfish ; ” and he took up the note and read it 
again, with a tender sadness, and sat down to answer it. . 

I 

“ Dear Bessie,” he said, u your news are good indeed. 1 
am heartily glad that your aunt is set straight in the eyes of 
the world ; in mine she never needed vindication. I do not 
know when I shall be in Ironburgh ; but with best wishes for 
you all, I am, dear Bessie, yours truly, 

G. Richardson.” 


430 


BLINDPITS. 


Then he walked about his room for a long time. He could 
see Bessie’s girlish rapture deepened by the dark experience 
she had had, and Mr. Grant leading her past the great dipt 
evergreens into the old house she was to transform into home 
for him ; and Miss Barclay shedding tears over the restoration 
of her good name, such as she had never shed over its loss. 
A day or two later he got another letter : — 

“ Dear Sir — I think it due to the great friendship you 
showed me at a time when friends were few, to inform you 
that at length the mystery is unravelled. My old friend, Miss 
Boston, was the victim of an accident. I have no patience to 
think of the woman through whose guilty silence I was sub- 
jected to such suffering; but I try to forgive her, and to look 
beyond her to the Source of all our trials, from whom it was 
sent to teach me some lesson, no doubt, wdiich I trust I shall 
not be slow to learn. The house at Blindpits is being 
thoroughly repaired, and we shall remove there as soon as it is 
ready to receive us. I do not acknowledge that, in the cir- 
cumstances, I was very guilty in wronging Mr. Grant as I 
did ; but it has been to me the occasion of much regret. 
When I apologised to him, he said, 1 Oh, nonsense, never 
speak of it.’ Thus, some people can take lightly what would 
be matter of life and death to others. Unless you return soon 
we shall not have the pleasure of seeing you here again ; but 
I trust we shall resume our intercourse very frequently at 
Blindpits. — I remain yours very sincerely, 

Barbara Barclay.” 

Then in the beginning of May came a letter from Mr. 
Dods. It was a long letter ; but Graham saw only one thing 
in it, and that was the sentence in which he said, 1 Bessie is 
to be married to Mr. Grant this month ; the day I have not 
heard yet. The gudewife says he might be her father ; but 
he’ll take the better care of her. I aye thought you would 
put in for her, but it seems no. Pettigrew, who is sometimes 
about Heatherburgh, was telling the gudewife that there has 
been a terrible row between Mr. Grant and his son about it ; 


BLINDPITS. 


431 


but I think the old man had a right to please himself — 
not that he is so old either, if she were not so young, and a 
kind of pet among us all. But it’s a good marriage for her, 
and I wish her much happiness,” etc. 

Graham put away the letter, and sat down to a volume of 
history he was studying ; hut his head buzzed. He read all 
the words, but the sense he made nothing of : he was thinking 
it was something not to know the day of the marriage.” 

Towards the end of the month, one of his acquaintances, 
who had a sister in Rotterdam, proposed to him that they 
should spend a few holidays by going to see that city. It was 
all one to Graham what he did with his holiday, and he as- 
sented. They traversed the streets, and were standing in the 
presence of Erasmus, when there appeared coming towards 
them a gentleman and a lady, who were too busy speaking to 
notice anyone. Graham had a full view of them, and he 
would have known either if he had only had a glimpse. His 
knees shook under him, and he turned and went away in the 
opposite direction, to the surprise of his companion, who stayed 
and took his fill of the statue, and of the foreign couple who 
were also “ doing ” it. When he got up to Graham again, he 
said, “ Why so fast ? did yon pretty girl frighten you ? She 
is a countrywoman of yours, travelling with her papa, and 
they are gathering useful information ; but they don’t know 
the language, and I had the pleasure of helping them. If 
you had not run away, you might have been useful. Come, 
why did you run away ? ” 

“ They were people I knew, and had no wish to meet.” 

“ You speak in riddles. Did you attempt to steal the 
young lady’s affections, and papa did not approve ? ” 
u He is not her father ; he is her — husband.” 

“Her husband! Was she smitten by the almighty dollar, 
and did she jilt your worship ? ” 

“ Neither — simply I did not wish to meet them,” said Gra- 
ham in tones that put an end to the subject. 

The youth struck into many themes ; and being a great 
speaker, he did not object to having brief answers, and what 


432 


BLINDP1TS. 


appeared close attention from Graham. He had been eloquent 
upon Goethe for" some time ; and when they parted he took a 
volume from his pocket and said, “ Did you ever read this ? it 
is not his best work at all, hut whatever he wrote is worth 
reading.” 

“ What is it ? ” 

“ The Sorrows of Werter.” 

“ Ho ; and I would like to read it.” 

And when he sat down alone, he opened the hook, and was 
fascinated, and went on to the end, when he tossed it away. 
“ He was a poor creature,” he thought ; “ a poor creature, 
gilded though he is with Goethe’s genius.” Glued as he had 
been to the pages, he could not help feeling as if his own 
emotions were caricatured in them. “Why did not Goethe 
give his hero a backbone of sense and principle ? ” He rose 
and, as it were, shook himself free — free from sickly repining, 
free to do his work in the world with a whole heart; and his 
spirit grew light, as if a burden had been thrown off. But 
many a time thereafter the bitterness of his disappointment 
returned upon him with almost its first force. And he opened 
his home letters reluctantly, feeling that, if there was any- 
thing of interest in them, tKey would only quicken his dull 
pain. But he was not oppressed with letters. His step- 
mother was no scribe, and expected him to write pretty fre- 
quently without a regular rejoinder. Mr. Dods wrote at 
intervals, and so did Miss Barclay. Bor two or three times 
he had opened Barbara’s letters with eagerness ; hut they 
were such model productions that he ceased to care for them. 
“ Queer,” he thought, “ that so good a woman should write 
such stiff, dry letters.” They were beautifully written on the 
best of paper, and sealed in a deft, lady-like manner ; hut 
they wanted entirely the Promethean spark. “ One careless 
line of Bessie’s,” he thought, “would have been more ihstinct 
with mind and heart.” 

Prom motives of delicacy, Miss Barclay never mentioned 
Bessie or her husband ; and from delicacy likewise, she never 
wrote of her own occupations or doings; and what was left 


BLINDPITS. 


433 


her but to frame sentences of a model kind ? She was not 
like the spider, which can spin a web out of its own bowels. 
Nor did he even hear from Mr. or .Mrs. Grant. Likely they 
were engulphed in their own happiness. But by chance he 
alighted on a nugget. He had not heard from John Grant 
for a long time ; and it struck him to write to Mary a short 
note of inquiry only, and in return he got a long sisterty 
letter, full of heart, and giving him all the kindly gossip of 
the place. Having no knowledge to restrain her, she enlarged 
on the happiness of Mr. Grant and his young wife, and Gra- 
ham tried not to wince like Werter ; and, in time, got accus- 
tomed to hear of “ my father-in-law and his wife ” as promi- 
nent figures in Mary’s letters. 

And she told how the ladies at Blindpits got on ; how 
affable Mrs. Barclay and Miss Dobbie were ; how Miss Bar- 
clay employed herself in continually doing good ; how she 
never wanted guests, and those of a kind not commonly run 
after — homeless governesses, needing change of air and rest — 
delicate bleached-looking children from the east end of Iron- 
burgh ; and it was whispered even that visitors had been 
received direct from the Ironburgh jail and some penitentiary. 
“ I envy,” said Mary, “ I am wicked enough sometimes to 
envy Miss Barclay the scope she has for doing good. And 
she is just cut out for it. Her strong practical sense and 
kindness of heart are the very qualities needed. Once she 
said to me, *' At one time I was very much of a Pharisee. 
If I did not say, I am sure I felt, in the stand-by-I-am-holier- 
tlian-thou fashion ; and I had little sympathy even with good- 
ness, unless of a particular pattern, and none at all with crea- 
tures who had lapsed into crime. Even yet I have a fight 
with the Pharisee ; but during that time ’ — [you know what 
time she means ] — ‘ I must have sunk altogether but for the 
kindness some people showed me, and the confidence they 
reposed in me ; and if I, who had conscious innocence as a 
support, needed something more, surely kindness and sym- 
pathy is the way to thaw frozen guilty natures.’ 

“And her sense prevents her going off in very Quixotic 
19 


4M 


BLINDPITS. 


efforts, or being often imposed on, although to me it appears 
better to he often imposed on than that one deserving case 
should he sent empty away. Deserving ! — who are we to talk 
of deserts ? I hate that phrase 1 the deserving poor’ — the cosy 
self-complacent people patting on the shoulder the very flower 
of Christ’s flock. 

“ I called on Bell Bogle the other day, and she let me see 
Miss Barclay’s photograph — Miss Barclay having called and 
given it to her, the tears were in her eyes, and I thought she 
had the impression that much had been forgiven her; hut 
John says her health is in such a shaky state just now that 
she would shed tears about anything or nothing. I told Mrs. 
Grant of it, and she said that her aunt was always too good 
for this world. Bor all that there is not'the close intercourse 
between Blindpits and Grantsburn that you would think. 
Miss Barclay is shy of Mr. Grant — not, I daresay, that she 
does not respect him highly, but I think she had poured her 
very heart’s blood into her love for her niece, and she feels the 
great change now that she belongs wholly to another. Ah, 
Graham ! it is a dangerous thing to love ; sooner or later dis- 
appointment comes ; your idol is not what you suppose, or fate 
separates you, or something ; the thorough dove-tailing of 
two natures is rare, surely. Of course, I speak in general. 
I don’t mean that John is not everything I could wish ; but 
then he has his profession, and it takes up most of his time 
and attention. After all, this quiet letter- writing between 
you and me is a very happy thing ; we don’t embark too much 
in it, and if it comes to grief we shall survive. You’ll think 
that a cool sort of friendship, but it will last and not make 
importunate demands, and that is much. Write me a long 
letter ; you know I have not much to occupy my time, and I 
judge from your tone that you are perhaps a little lonely. — 
Yours, “ Mary Grant.” 

Then Graham knew that John Grant’s wife was not 
altogether happy, and his kind heart ached for her, and the 
correspondence went on and was a comfort to both. 


CHAPTER LIX. 


At the end of a year and a half Graham was summoned 
home by the death — sudden in the end — of his step-mother. 
Why should he fear to meet Mr. Grant ? — he had got over 
that — or Bessie ? he was steeled now, steeled against any re- 
lapse into his former feelings. Bessie might cut bread and 
butter for a whole juvenile party, and he could see her, he 
was sure, without any species of Werterism coming over him. 

He went straight to Mrs. Richardson’s house, and was re- 
ceived by Miss Grant, who since her brother’s marriage had 
lived with her sister. She was in deep grief, but not so ab- 
sorbed that she did not feel it a consolation to have Graham 
with her. He was one of the family, and she could talk freely 
to him about anything. 

“ Well, Graham,” she said, “ it would have been a satisfac- 
tion to my poor sister if she could have seen you before her 
death, but it was not to be, it seems.” 

“ If I could have known ” * 

“ Ah ! but you could not know ; we are short-sighted 
creatures indeed, but reason tells us her death is not to be 
lamented. She had very little health, and she is gone where 
all her trials and vexations are over.” 

“ I am very sorry ” 

u Ho, don’t be sorry ; but you can’t know what we have suf- 
fered since you went away — the grief and vexation ” 

“ Indeed ! I did not know — what about ? ” 

" The vexation my brother has given us.” 

te What ! Mr. Grant — how ? ” 


436 


BLKSTDPITS. 


“ With that wretched foolish marriage.” Graham started. 
“ If he had only married any woman of his own age, hut a 
girl — a child without the slightest experience — a man of his 
sense and age, for IJblame him, what could she know ? only 
her friends ought to have prevented it ; then the notoriety of 
the aunt ; really there was no circumstance wanting to com- 
plete our mortification. 

“I thought always that you and my mother were well 
pleased. She never wrote anything to the contrary.” 

“What would have been the use? it would not have 
mended matters. Not that we had any selfish feelings about 
it, if he had only married suitably. You don’t know, perhaps, 
that a year ago an old friend of my sister’s left her a good 
deal of money. She, poor woman ! made her will only last 
week, and she gives a large share of it to you. This house 
and all else belongs to me. No ; we were quite independent. 
Our grief was for him, after living so long as he did, to do 
such a foolish thing at last — the country rang with it for 
weeks.” 

“ As for the country ringing with it, what did it matter ? 
If he and his wife are happy, whose business is it to find 
fault ? — Neither yours nor mine, auntie,” and his voice soft- 
ened, for he knew that in degree Miss Grant was also suffer- 
ing, from having lost the one object of her life. I did not 
know I was to come back to find myself rich. I only wish 
my mother had lived to enjoy it.” 

“We could all wish that ; but in this world we don’t often 
get our wishes ; and no doubt it is better for us. When we 
do get them, we are sometimes caught in our own snare, as 
witness my brother.” 

“ If you mean his marriage, aunt, it was the sweetest snare 
ever a man fell into. I have known Bessie — Mrs. Grant, I 
mean — for years, and she has not a fault.” 

“ She is ridiculously young for him. If, with all her notori- 
ety, he had even married the aunt, it would have been more 
rational.” 

“ Why, how could she help her notoriety ? If you had 


BLINDPITS. 


437 


been at Blindpits when Miss Boston died, you would have 
probably shared it. When I think of all she suffered” 

“ It was her misfortune, no doubt, and she was much to be 
pitied. But one would rather give such a story a wide berth. 
bTow, confess you would prefer marrying into a less celebrated 
family ? ” 

“ I’m not in a mood for confession,” he said, feeling his very 
inmost history was being played upon by ignorant, unsympa- 
thetic fingers. 

Mr. Grant met Graham precisely as if they had never 
parted, and Graham did his best to follow his example. 
When the sad business that brought them to Eastburgh was 
over, they went together to Heatherburgh. 

Mr. Grant talked of Graham’s future, and cross-questioned 
him as to his views. Did he wish such a situation as his, Mr. 
Grant’s ? Graham said such situations were difficult to be 
had ; if suck a one came in his way he might take it, but he 
had no expectation it would. Mr. Grant said he would look 
out for him, and he would have all the Marquis’s influence. 
Whereupon Graham muttered something about being obliged 
— a feeling he had not at the moment ; and Mr. Grant took 
no notice, and passed to indifferent things. 

At the station Meg was waiting her master. The time 
was October again, two years from that memorable one when 
Graham went abroad to learn German and the more difficult 
art of forgetfulness. He seemed in a dream. The little quiet 
station, the people belonging to it, Mr. Grant, his horse, the 
man holding it, were all as of yore ; and he felt as if he must 
have come from Ironburgh for a holiday, when he heard Mr. 
Grant say to his man — 

“ Take Meg back. Tell your mistress I’ll walk ; and that 
I’m bringing Mr. Richardson with me.” 

Then Graham started. “No,” he said, “don’t let me 
detain you. I promised to take up my quarters with Mary 
and John.” 

“ Nonsense ; let them wait, and come with me. Bessie has 
been counting on having you.” 


438 


BLINDPITS. 


“ I’ll come to-morrow, not to-niglit. Give my compliments 
to Mrs. Grant.” 

“It’s too bad,” be said. “Very well, we’ll cultivate 
patience till to-morrow ; ” and shaking hands heartily, he rode 
away. 

Graham looked after the familiar, centaur-like figure that 
his boyish eyes had so often gazed at with admiration and 
pride — that man was going home to Bessie — his wife. He 
had been two years forging his armor ; but if he had gone to 
Grantsburn that night its temper would have been sorely tried. 
In truth, now that it had come to the point, he shrank from 
trying it. 

If John Grant and his wife were not the happiest couple in 
the world, neither he nor she was wanting to each other in 
the presence of strangers ; and while Graham had virtuously 
resolved to try to improve Mary’s position by making an effort 
to open her husband’s eyes more fully to her merits, and in 
some shape giving him good advice, he found that Dr. Grant 
left no visible peg on which to hang a remark. He began to 
think he must have made a mistake, that his own dreariness 
had led him to misinterpret the tone of Mary’s letters, and he 
was well pleased to rest in this belief. 

“ Have you seen my sister yet ? ” suddenly asked Dr. 
Grant. 

“ Your sister ! — who is she ? — no,” said Graham. 

“ Oh, he means the baby at Grantsburn ; it is the dearest 
little thing ; you’ll see it to-morrow,” said Mary. 

“ I can tell you it pushes me into the shade,” said John. 
“ I’m a poor neglected child. It’s an awful thing to have a 
step-mother ! ” 

Mary laughed. “Yours is a formidable one,” she said, 
“ and you are so completely at her mercy.” 

“ Bessie <?a n hold her own,” said Dr. M ‘Vicar, “ which 
people had need to be able to do in this world.” 

“ If she doesn’t hold mine too,” said John, “ I don’t 
object.” 

Mary was thinking how she could change the subject, when 


BLINDPITS. 


439 


her husband was called away. Dr. Grant had not got over the 
sense he had that Miss Barclay’s acquittal was his defeat, and 
he had never forgiven his father’s marriage. He had felt 
compelled by public opinion to say that he was glad Miss 
Barclay’s innocence was proved; but nothing compelled him 
to look graciously on his father’s marriage, and he had no 
intercourse with Grantsburn beyond what an appearance of * 
civility called for. 

He had in vain tried to inoculate his wife with his views on 
this and other subjects, but Mary had long since taken the 
measure of her husband’s moral nature, and she refused to 
creep inside that measure ; indeed, it was impossible to her. 
Perhaps it was an earnest of better things that he was awed 
somewhat by his wife’s goodness, and did not unduly push his 
attempts to make her act according to his standard. 

u You’ll see,” Mary went on, u that Grantsburn looks 
better than it ever did ; and I am sure that if ever a marri- 
age was made in heaven, that one was. At least it has 
brought a good deal of heaven to earth with it, and yet John 
and his aunt can’t speak of it with ordinary patience even 
now.” 

11 Molly,” said her father, u how wouldjyou like if I were 
to give you a stepmother ? ” 

“ If she was like Bessie, I couldn’t object.” 

“ Couldn’t you ? — you wouldn’t mind your father making a 
fool of himself in his old age ? Strangers always take Grant’s 
wife to be his daughter.” 

“ Happiness doesn’t depend on the mistakes of strangers, 
and people may be well matched in point of age, and miser- 
able enough for all that.” It is to be hoped that Mary Grant 
did not speak from her own experience. 

“ Well,” said Dr. MWicar, “ I did think Grant’s marriage 
a pity, and I’ll not bring a young lady here as your step- 
mamma, Molly ; keep your mind easy. It doesn’t look so ill 
now ; but twenty years after this ” 

“ What’s the use, papa, of vexing one’s-self about twenty 
years hence ? We can’t tell what may be on the morrow. I 
'diink every day I count less and less on outward appearance.” 


440 


BLINDPITS. 


Next morning Graham took his way to Blindpits. He 
found it changed. Miss Barclay had built, and papered, and 
painted, and refurnished, and anew laid out the garden and 
shrubbery, till she had brought it well abreast of the age, as 
Miss Boston had spoken of ; and everything was kept in that 
order which betokens efficient administration and a well filled 
purse. 

Miss Barclay was sewing, but she put down her work and 
welcomed Graham very warmly, and she did not take it up 
again, which he expected her to do, for she had the very good, 
although to weaker fellow-mortals sometimes the irritating, 
habit of never being a moment idle. Knowing this, Graham 
felt the compliment the greater. 

“ You’ve made great improvements here,” he said, after the 
first greetings were over, and the awkward pause had come 
which comes so often when people feel deeply and skim surface 
topics. 

“ Yes ; I think they are improvements ; — they are changes 
at all events, and served to occupy us when active occupation 
was an object.” 

“ You’re not changed,” he said ; “ I don’t see the least 
difference on you.” And indeed the sweet serene face and 
trim figure did not look a day older. 

“ Do you not ? ” she said. “ Do you not see the white hairs 
making their appearance ? ” 

“ Yes, I see them. If I were you I would pull them out ; 
you could pull them all out in ten minutes.” 

“ What good end would be served by pulling them out ? ” 

“ I really don’t know, only it is generally thought they 
make people look older.” 

They don’t make people older than they really are, they 
only indicate that they are older.” 

“ Come,” said he, laughing, “ don’t be strong-minded ; if 
you think it a waste of time to do it, I’ll pull them out now, 
if you’ll let me.” 

“ Thank you — weak or strong minded, I can by this time 
contemplate grey hairs with serenity ; Bessie wished to pull 
them out, but I declined.” 


BLINDPITS. 


441 


“ Mrs. Grant is well, I believe,” lie said rather stiffly. “ I 
came from Eastburgh with Mr. Grant yesterday.” 

“ Yes, she is very well ; she is a good deal occupied, and we 
don’t see much of her here.” 

“ You’ll miss her?” 

“Yes,” she said shortly; “I try to make work for myself 
here, and time passes quickly enough. But what of yourself 
— where are you, and what are you going to do ? tell me.” 

“ I’m here, doing nothing ; what I shall do is to be seen ; 
I’ve done precious little as yet.” 

“ What of your Continental experience ? I should like to 
hear something of the educational system in Germany — 
female education especially.” 

“ I’m ashamed to say I know nothing about it.” 

“ And their schemes of benevolence ” 

Here Miss Barclay was interrupted by the entrance of her 
mother and Miss Dobbie. These ladies could not be suffi- 
ciently delighted at meeting Graham once more. 

“ And are you,” said Mrs. Barclay, when the flutter had 
subsided, u are you as fond of backgammon as ever ? ” Eor, 
like other self-indulgent people, Mrs. Barclay was persuaded 
that Graham had played so often with her because he was 
passionately fond of the game, little dreaming how his 
patience and good nature had been put to the proof. 

“ I haven’t played a single game since you saw me ; you 
would find me an easy victim after being so long out of 
practice.” 

“ It would not do to trust to that, but we must try some 
evening.” 

“ And have you been at Grantsburn ? ” said Miss Dobbie. 
“ Ho ! then you have not seen how happily settled our dear 
Bessie is, and what a very sweet baby she has. What 
changes a little time makes ! but they’ve all been happy 
changes since you left. You wouldn’t expect, when you went 
away, to find Bessie mistress at Grantsburn when you re- 
tnrned. Did you not get such a pleasant surprise when you 
heard it ? ” 


412 


BLINDPITS. 


“ Bessie,” put in Mrs. Barclay, u Bessie always had the im- 
pression that she saw you or at least your back, -when she was 
on her wedding-trip ; it was at Rotterdam, hut you were a 
long way from Rotterdam, weren’t you ? ” 

" Yes, at Hamburg.” 

“ Then she had been mistaken, it seems. And have you 
been in Ironburgh ; and how are those worthy creatures the 
Dodses ? ” 

Not having been at Ironburgh, Graham could not tell ; and 
feeling that each of the ladies was remarkably like herself — 
as, indeed, whom should she be like, and is not that the charm 
of old friends ? — he rose to take his way to Grantsburn, where 
he thought he would like to find Bessie altogether different 
from the Bessie of former times, so that the part he had to 
act might be easier to him. 




CHAPTER LX. 


He did not know whether to he glad or sorry when he fell 
in with John Grant, who offered to go with him. Upon the 
whole he was glad, it would be less trying than to meet 
Bessie alone. She had known him then at Rotterdam ! 

“ Yes ; Bessie, as it seemed, was happily settled for life. 
What was it to her that her husband was more that twice her 
own age ; or to him, except that, perhaps, it blended a more 
exquisite tenderness with his love than it might otherwise 
have had. She transfigured the world for him. 

Graham and Ur. Grant walked along without speaking so 
much as two such old friends might have been expected to do. 

a You’re a lucky fellow,” said Dr. Grant, “ to spend so much 
time idle, and then come back to find a handsome legacy.” 

u I wasn’t altogether idle ; and the legacy was certainly a 
surprise to me.” 

“ So it was to me, and a great one. I think my father’s 
sister might have sent some of it my way ; but I am no hand 
at cozening old ladies.” 

“ You should study the art,” said Graham, good-naturedly. 
“ A medical man has golden opportunities for its exercise.” 

"-If one could count on anything women will do; but they 
change like the wind. I’m sick of them. I’ll neyer have the 
chance of such a haul from 1113’' stepmother. If my father 

had not made such a fool of himself ” 

“ Stop, John ! Any man would have ennobled himself by 
marrying Bessie Barclay; and your father deserves something 
different at your hands than to be spoken of in that way.” 


444 


BLINDPITS. 


“ I don’t know that. I might as well not have a father ; 
and of course I’ll never touch a farthing of his money.” 

Graham made no rejoinder, and they went slowly on. 
They were in the walk which led to the house through the 
herd of clipped yews ; the road w r ound by the side of the park, 
and was divided from it by a wire fence. They had only to 
turn a corner and they would he in sight of the house. John 
pointed to this corner, and said, “Do you see that hat? 
That’s an odd place for a hat to he lying.” Graham was not 
attending, and did not speak. Likely he was bracing himself 
for the coming interview. 

“ See ! ” cried Grant. “ Is that a man’s figure in the grass ? 
Some fellow drunk. It’s early for that.” 

They did not hurry till they w T ere within a few steps of the 
prostrate form, when each suddenly strode forward, and was 
on his knees by the side of it in a moment. 

“ My father ! ” cried John. 

“ Has he fainted ? ” cried Graham ; and in an instant he 
was at the burn, filled his hat with water, and brought it to 
dash on the upturned face lying among the grass. The face 
did not look ghastly, the tan of the summer’s sun prevented 
that, and there was no sign of pain in it. He might have 
been sleeping, so peaceful did he look. 

John had torn open the vest, and laid his hand on the 
heart. 

“ Graham,” he said, in a low, awed tone, “ it’s of no use — 
lie has been dead some time.” 

“ Dead ! ” echoed Graham ; “ it’s impossible ! I parted 
with him only yesterday in perfect health.” 

Yesterday ! It was little more than an hour since he had 
left his wife and child watching his retreating figure from the 
window, since he had turned round and waved his hand to 
them. And now he was caught into eternity ! — he had waved 
his last farewell ! 

His son and Graham rose from his side, and looked at each 
other. It seemed to Graham that he was in a dream. John 
spoke. “It is long,” he said, “since I remember M‘Vicar 


BLINDPITS. 


445 


asking me if I knew if my father had heart-disease, for he 
had seen him nearly faint one day. I said he had no disease 
of any kind that I knew of ; hut he has had it. Well, it’s the 
death I would choose for mj^self if I had my choice.” 

Graham still gazed vacantly at the doctor, who went on — 

“ There’s the girl he married ! She’ll he in a terrible wa} r . 
Who’s to tell her? You had better — you are her oldest ac- 
quaintance ; and I’ll go round by the hack, and get men to 
carry him in.” 

John’s matter-of-fact presence of mind in such awful cir- 
cumstances brought hack Graham’s scared attention. 

“Ho,” he said ; “I can’t do it — I can’t do it — I can’t tell 
her. I could not hear to see her grief ; ” and even at that 
moment the thought flashed on him — “ She would never forget 
me as the messenger of evil tidings.” 

“ Then who’s to do it ? — it will have to he done.” 

“ It will have to he done,” Graham echoed. 

“ Perhaps Mary might do it. Yes, Mary will do it. That 
will he better. Will you go hack and send her here ?” 

Graham went away in a tumult of thought and feeling. 
He had once believed that he could smooth Bessie’s path when 
it was very rough ; but he was powerless in this strait. How 
thankful he was that he had no hitter words, or even thoughts, 
of Mr. Grant to look hack on ! He was his oldest and best 
friend ; and although he had shrunk away from him since his 
marriage, he had never ceased to honor him. And he recalled 
with gladness the circumstance that not twenty hours since he 
had heartily returned the warm pressure of his hand. 

Mary saw him pass the window, and hurried to meet him 
“ What has happened ? Something has happened, I see; 
Has John ” 

“Ho, John is all right; but something has happened.” 

“ Hot papa ? ” 

“ Ho. Mr. Grant ” 

“ Has not been thrown from his horse ? Meg has not been 
so ungrateful ? I hope it is not very serious ? ” 

Then Graham gradually told her. She stood transfixed. 


146 


BLINDPITS. 


“ Dead, did you say ? You found him on the grass dead ? 
I’ll go to her. But how can I tell her ? — how can I ? ” 

How could she, indeed ? And she had to wait for a time 
till she herself recovered from the shock of such sudden and 
appalling news. 

John Grant went round to the hack of the house to get 
some of the servants ; hut hearing that Mrs. Grant was out, 
he went boldly in and alarmed the household. In passing out 
again at the front he encountered Mrs. Ainslie’s brougham at 
the door, with that lady inside it. She hailed her nephew. 
“ Bless me, John ! ” she cried, “you look put out — more put 
out than I ever saw you. You and my brother have not 
quarrelled ? ” 

“No, I have not quarrelled with him yet, and I’m not going 
to begin now.” 

“ Are Mr. and Mrs. Grant at home then ? ” 

“ Mrs. Grant has gone out ; my father is ” 

“ Gracious, John, what in the world is it ? Dead ! ” she 
exclaimed ; “ dropped down dead of heart disease. Did you 
know he had that, or did he ? ” 

“ I didn’t, nor did he, I think.” 

“ Goodness ! which of us is safe ? and Bessie is out — poor 
thing, poor thing ! But it is as well. Where has she gone ? 
— you don’t know. How is she to be told ? Should not her 
aunt he sent for ? ” 

“ I have sent for Marjr.” 

“ Mary is all very well ; but I’ll just drive to Blindpits and 
let Miss Barclay know. I need not say, John, how much I 
sympathise with you.” 

“And Mr. Grant is really gone,” she said to herself as she 
drove away ; “ how strange and sudden ! I wonder if he has 
left a will, and how his widow is provided for ? ” 

Before her husband had gone out, Bessie had said to him 
that she was going to Blindpits, where she expected to find 
Graham. 

“You know,” she said, “aunt and he w*ere great friends; 
and I’ll bring them both hack to dinner ; and we’ll have such 


BLINDPITS. 


447 


a glorious evening talking over old times, before we knew you, 
when I borrowed Graham’s books through Mr. Dods, and 
when we read Mr. Dods’ poems together. They were my most 
exciting interest in those days. Now life is all interest and 
poetry.” 

“ Is it ? Do you make me out to be poetical ? ” 

“ Yes, you are my poem — mine — to which I try to set my- 
self, like perfect music, into noble words.” 

“ Bess,” he said fondly, “ thou art a self-deceiving little 
witch ; there’s not a particle of poetry in my nature.” 

“ You’re no judge. You don’t know poetry when you see 
it. I do.” 

“ You’ll need a microscope to see it in me ; the only poetical 
thing I ever did was marrying you.” 

“ I would like to argue the point, like Jack Easy ; but we’ll 
do so another time. Be off now, and don’t keep us waiting 
dinner.” 

“ I know of nothing to make me do that to-day. I’ll be 
punctual as the sun.” 

The nurse was coming in with his little daughter. He 
stopped and kissed the child, then turned round, as has been 
said, and waved his hand to them standing at the window* 
and not many minutes after he lay in death. Surely, 

“ The best of life came round its close, 

To light him to the door.” 

The dinner was cooking, the postman was leaving his 
letters, his watch ticked on, his newspaper lay unopened, his 
clerk’s pen scratched on in his office the documents he was 
never to see, his baby was sleeping, his wife’s blithe laugh 
was ringing in the garden at Blindpits, and he — where was 
he? 

Mrs. Ainslie drove on. She had been a widow. When a 
young thing like Bessie she had lost her husband at a stroke, 
and who better qualified to enter into her feelings ? She half 
expected to find her at Blindpits, and somewhat excited she 
drove on. That Mrs. Ainslie was not heartless has been 
remarked before, but there are people to whom excitement of 


448 


BLINDPITS. 


any kind always does good, like a brisk breeze in a heavy at- 
mosphere ; it is not meant, of course, that Mrs. Ainslie wa3 
consciously the better for it at this time. It was her nature, 
which the shifting life she had led so long had not tended to 
thwart — it was her nature to look at most things from a 
business point of view. Knowing that Mr. Ainslie’s will was 
not made, she resolved it should be made, and that without 
delay. She was not ignorant of what portion in Scotland falls 
to a childless widow, and after such a lesson on the uncertainty 
of life as she had just had, any loss of time would be worse 
than folly. She had always known that Mr. Grant was not a 
rich man, but she was aware his life was pretty highly 
insured, and although he might have saved nothing, that with 
Miss Boston’s money would make his widow very well off. 
i( And she will marry again ; the child may be a little in the 
way, but if a suitable thing offers, she will marry again.” In 
such channels did her thoughts run. Suddenly her coachman 
pulled up, and Bessie Grant’s bright face appeared at the car- 
riage window ; behind her stood Miss Barclay. 

u Are you going to Blindpits ? I have aunt here, but grand- 
mamma and Miss Dobbie are at home ; do drive on and see 
them.” 

“ But, my dear, it’s you I wish to see. Come in, will you, 
and let me drive you and Miss Barclay back. 

Bessie turned to her aunt, “ What do you say ? ” then to 
Mrs. Ainslie, “We had counted on a walk, and will be sorry 
to miss it ; it seems a sin to drive on a day like this.” 

“ Come, Miss Barclay, you’ll not object to a drive ; do come 
in,” and holding out her hand to Bessie she drew her in and 
set her on the seat beside her, still keeping hold of her hand. 
“Yes; ” she said, “it is a fine day for walking. Ah ! I re- 
member when Lieutenant Gascoigne died, how the sun shone. 
I think you know he died suddenly ; and the people at the 
station wondered who would tell me, they were all afraid ; 
then they got a good old parson to do it, and he always told 
me to think of it as a translation — positively as a translation 
— such as Methusaleh’s or Elijah, you know ” 


BLIXDPITS. 


449 


“ Bessie, who was familiar with' the 'particulars, felt herself 
wicked in that she could hardly avoid a smile, and wondered 
whither Mrs. Ainslie was tending. 

Barbara, who still sprang to a matter-of-fact mistake as a 
pointer to game, said, ts Enoch — it was Enoch who was trans- 
lated.” 

“ Yes, yes, Enoch. It does not signify ; but was it not a 
beautiful idea ? ‘ Your husband/ he said, 1 has escaped the 

decay of old age, and the pain and humiliation of a long ill- 
ness/ But ah ! his death left me nearly destitute in a strange 
land; while you, Mrs. Grant, are in the midst of kindred, 
with competent means.” 

This was Mrs. Ainslie’s way of preparing Bessie’s mind for 
the news awaiting her. 

“ I know I am very well off,” said Bessie, wonderingly. 
“ Your case at that time, and mine now, will hardly compare, 
Mrs. Ainslie.” 

“ Miss Barclay, you must help me. She must know ; the 
news have gone abroad already like wild-fire ” 

“ What news ? ” said Bessie, innocently, and not alarmed, 
for she knew that Mrs. Ainslie always made the most of 
everything. “ What news ? ” 

Mrs. Ainslie stooped across, and whispered something to 
Barbara. 

A low cry escaped her. “ Oh, not that,” she said ; “ surely 
not that ! ” 

“ Not the shadow of a doubt of it.” 

“ Let us go back to Blindpits, Bessie. Oh, let us go back 
to Blindpits,” entreated Barbara. 

“ No ; my husband expects us to dinner, and we are not too 
soon. Why, what is it ? You needn’t speak in whispers ; it 
can be nothing affecting me much, for I know that Mr. Grant 
and baby are perfectly well ; ” but a shade of uneasiness . crept 
over her face, and her breath came quickly. 

Mrs. Ainslie pressed her hand, and said solemnly, “No, my 
dear, your husband doesn’t expect you to dinner ; ” and then 
she distinctly related the circumstances. 


450 


BLINDPITS. 


Bessie looked, with a faint incredulous smile on her face, 
from her aunt to Mrs. Ainslie, and hack to her aunt ; then a 
deadly paleness came over her, and she fell hack on the seat 
senseless. Was her spirit away, hovering on the mysterious 
border-land, in search of his f 


CHAPTER LXI. 


But Bessie lived, how she did not know ; hut she lived 
broken and bereft. Eriends came round her ; but words of 
sympathy were to her as idle tales. If they had compre- 
hended her sorrow, surely they would have let her alone. 
But they did not comprehend it — nay, they doubted if it were 
very deep, for to her it was far too sacred to be exposed to the 
common eye, and she shut it in her heart. In her short life 
she had been once through the fire before, and she had learned 
self-control. Even her aunt was astonished, and concluded 
that she possessed a strength of mind she had not suspected. 
Hot to her aunt had she betrayed her awful desolation ; had 
she not once doubted him ? But, looking out on the winter’s 
sea, she accepted its sympathy. “ There is sorrow on the sea, 
it cannot be quiet,” she would say to her little daughter ; 
“but I can be quiet though my heart is breaking” — and a 
baptism of tears would fall on the child’s face. Among people 
she could exert herself, but alone — and she would have been 
always alone if possible — life stood still — it was a mere 
vacancy. Many months went and came, and, except by the 
growth of her child, she hardly noticed them. 

“ Grant the factor ” had been a power in the county for a 
long time ; the Marquis owned the land, but the factor owned 
sway over the Marquis, and, except an occasional error in 
judgment, he had exercised his power well. There was regret 
from the castle to the cottage, the more, as who would have 
thought it — a man in his prime, full of health and strength ; 
but men don’t speak much of death except as a piece of news 
— the very oldest and most certain of all — a bit of news ! 


452 


EHTNDPIT3 


But the man being dead, people wonder next who is to fill 
his shoes. Even John Grant broached the subject at his own 
table that very evening — 

“ My father has had a good time of it with the Marquis. 
I wish I had been brought up to succeed him ; even as it is, I 
would throw physic to the dogs if I thought I had a chance, 
but his lordship will choose one bred to the business. Gra- 
ham, you should put in.” 

“Not to-night-; surely you would not have me do it to- 
night ? ” 

“ Well, I wager there are people getting up their testimoni- 
als and applications by this time.” 

“ Not his nearest connections, however.” 

“ I can’t see what that has to do with a purely business 
matter. The great thing in these days is to strike while the 
iron is hot.” 

“ 0 John ! ” cried Mary, “ if you had seen that young 
creature at Grantsburn, stupefied with sorrow, as I saw her. ” 

“ I can suppose it ; I can believe that she is sorry about my 
father’s death, or she ought to be, for he was infatuated about 
her ; but my loss is more irreparable than hers — I can never 
have another father ; I shouldn’t wonder to see her have an- 
other husband before the year is out.” 

“John,” cried Graham, “if you don’t respect your father’s 
memory, I know Bessie Grant well enough to be sure she 
will.” 

“ I mean no disrespect to my father’s nfemory.” 

“Your aunt, John, came while I was there,” said Mary, 
“ not knowing anything about it. Poor woman ! what a shock 
— what a shock it was to her! The sight of her sorrow 
roused even Bessie — you know Miss Grant was never very 
friendly to her. She rose, and kneeling beside her, said, with 
a piteous sob, ‘ 0 Miss Grant ! your brother never loved you 
less because he married me.’ Miss Grant was much moved. 
Miss Barclay is there too.” 

Miss Grant had come back to visit her old home, prepared 
to look with jealous eyes on the mother and child — and lo ! 


BLIXDPITS. 


453 


they were all that was left to her of the brother who had been 
the object of her life. 

Graham lingered at Heatherhurgh. It was true he had no 
business there, hut then neither had he business anywhere 
else. * 

The factorship was still vacant, hut contrary to Dr. Grant’s 
advice he made no effort to secure it. Probably he had his 
own reasons. Be that as it may, he got a note from the Mar- 
quis’s law-agent asking him to call on a certain day at his 
chambers in Easthurgh 5 and when he went he found his lord- 
ship there, who conversed with him affably, telling him what a 
faithful, excellent servant he had always found his late factor, 
and many other things, till he came to the object of this meet- 
ing, which was, in consequence of the terms he had heard Mr. 
Grant speak in of Graham, and in compliment to his memory, 
to offer Graham the situation. 

“ I should like,” said the Marquis, “ that Mrs. Grant retain 
the house while she wishes it, hut she might not object mean- 
time to having her late husband’s nephew as an inmate ; in 
fact, I think some such arrangement would suit remarkably 
well.” 

“ Mr Grant was not my uncle, nor any relation of mine ; his 
sister married my father, that’s all,” said Graham. 

u Oh ! ” said the Marquis, “ that’s how it was ; well, it 
makes no difference — then it’s settled, I suppose?” 

“ So far as I am concerned it is. It was suggested to me to 
apply for it, and I considered the matter fully, and came to 
the conclusion that I would not, having it in my power has 
not changed my mind.” Then he respectfully declined the 
offer to the astonishment of the Marquis. Of course he was 
neither pressed to take the place nor to give his reasons for not 
taking it. . It was a piece of preferment for which there would 
he many candidates ; but the nobleman did not feel more gra- 
ciously disposed towards the youth who had practically made 
light of what he considered his thoughtful patronage. 

Eiercely as Graham had resented, as little short of sacrilege, 
John Grant saying that his father’s widow would probably 


454 


BLINDPITS. 


marry before the year was out, the remark clung to him. 
Would she marry ? and if she did, was it possible she would 
marry him ? It was the bare possibility of this that made 
him reject the Marquis’s offer. She should not marry him as 
Mr. Grant’s successor in office. He would bear her away to 
new scenes ; that brief year and a half should be like a dream 
to her — a dream — or as if it had never been. 


CHAPTER LXII. 


He hud not seen Bessie yet. He was hearing often enough 
of her, for he went frequently to Blindpits, and had fallen 
into his old post at backgammon with Mrs. Barclay, and 
somehow he liked it. It brought up bygone times very 
vividly ; he could imagine Bessie watching the game ; would 
such a time come again? Do as he might, he could not 
banish the thought ; he felt as if he were as had as John 
Grant. After the long winter the spring of hope was stirring 
in the roots of his love for Bessie ; guilty though he felt, he 
could no more help it than he could help living. If he had 
been conscious of no other feeling than friendly sympathy, he 
would have gone to Grantsburn at once, and he meant to go 
before he left. He was waiting now for Miss Grant ; he had 
arranged to he with her in Eastburgh during the winter, hav- 
ing made up his mind to attend various classes there. He 
was walking by the shore-road where he had been wont to 
exercise Meg, and where he met Bessie when she first visited 
Miss Boston. He saw a lady’s figure wrapped in a black 
cloak coming towards him, and never passed a thought as to 
who it might be, when, as she came near, she suddenly threw 
up her veil, held out her hand and said — 

“ Graham, how do you do ? why have you not come to see 
me all this time ? ” 

It was Bessie’s pure, well-like eyes that looked up to him, 
but the mirth was gone from her face, even the mobility was 
gone ; there were brown hollows below the eyes, and the 
sweetness of her expression showed like sunshine on snow. 
The suddenness of her appearance nearly cost him his self- 


456 


BLINDPITS. 


possession. Except the glimpse at Rotterdam, he had not 
seen her since that night when he rushed from her into the 
streets of Ironhurgh. 

“I’ve been often thinking of you, Mrs. Grant, hut supposed 
you might not care for visitors.” 

“ Visitors ! no ; but I don’t count you an ordinary visitor.” 

There was a pause. She was thinking of her present grief ; 
he was trying to suppress feeling altogether. 

“ I’m glad to see you out,” he said at last. 

“ I came out to look at a rock down there. It is three 
years — three short years to-day — since I sat there, and let the 
tide creep round me. I would have perished if Mr. Grant 
had not saved me.” 

She spoke in a kind of far away voice, and looked towards 
the sea with tearless eyes, then turned round and saw Graham 
gazing on her pityingly ; her stoniness vanished. 

“ 0 Graham ! ” she said, “ I may speak to you. Miss 
Grant is naturally occupied with her own loss, and aunt never 
did him full justice ; besides, she says I have many mitigations 
of my trial — I should think of my mercies as well as of my 
miseries ; hut what can I think of but him who is gone for 
ever, and I’ll never see him more ? ” 

And she hurst into a very passion of tears. Graham stood 
by and said nothing. What could he say ? She said — 

“ You’ll think me silly and unworthy to have been his wife, 
hut I’ve never given way like this before, except when alone. 
0 Graham, you know what I have lost ! ” 

“ I can share your grief, Bessie. If I could only do or say 
anything to comfort you ; hut I can’t — time only can do 
that.” 

“ You think I’ll forget ; — impossible.” 

“ I didn’t say forget.” 

“ Ah, if I had the courage and energy to forget myself, and 
devote myself to others, as my good aunt does ! but I am 
selfish. Even now I am making you unhappy,” she said, 
seeing the deep pity in his face. “But don’t grieve for me,” 
she said, pleadingly ; “ I’ll try and be submissive ; and, as 


BLINDPITS. 


457 


aunt says, I’ve much left you know. She doesn’t know that 
my all has been taken ; yet she too has suffered much and 
keenly. If I could only rise to her point of view ! ” 

Graham was thinking that grief, and healing also, came to 
each in different guise. Bessie Grant’s nature and Miss Bar- 
clay’s were so opposed, that if they ever came to the same 
summit, it must he by wholly separate routes. » 

“ Can you come home with me ? if you can, I’ll let you see 
my child. I have been neglecting even her in my selfishness* 
Not that, perhaps, you will care to see her ; she is too young 
yet to interest people.” 

“ I should like to see her.” 

As they walked, a tinge of color came into Bessie’s face 
from the air and exercise. At Grantsburn they found Dr. 
Grant sitting with the two ladies. Bessie shook hands with 
him, then turned to Graham, and said — 

“ Come with me to the nursery.” 

As he left the room he caught a smile on John’s face which 
made his nerves tingle. He thought — u Bessie did not see 
that, hut if she had, not a fibre in her nature could have 
helped her to interpret it.” 

In the nursery a girl was sitting sewing beside as pretty a 
nest as was ever devised for a baby. 

Is she sleeping, Mary ? ” Mrs. Grant asked. 

11 Yes, ma’am.” 

“ This is Queeny,” she said to Graham; “I’m sorry she is 
sleeping.” 

He looked into the cradle. She seemed the embodiment of 
absolute baby rest. There was neither sound nor the appear- 
ance of breathing ; the long dark eyelashes lay dreamily on 
the marble cheek ; one perfect little hand was doubled up and 
pressed to its chin. 

“ How beautiful ! ” he said softly. “ What did you say her 
name was ? ” 

“ Bessie is her name, and she claims so much attention I 
called her Queen Bess ; her father took it up and called her 
Queeny ; it distinguished her from me.” 

20 


458 


BLINDPITS. 


She was calm again, almost stolidly so. 

“ You are to be in Eastburgh all winter, I hear ; come again 
and see me, and just now will you excuse me downstairs ? I 
can’t go down. Good-bye,” and she held out her hand. 

“ Good-bye,” he said, “ and kiss Queeny for me when she’s 
done sleeping.” 

“ Now, Mary, you may go ; I’ll stay with baby.” 

Mary readily availed herself of the liberty. And then 
Bessie sank on her knees by the cradle. 

“ 0 God ! ” she said, “ help me to live, help me to be 

thankful to live ; pardon my selfishness, my agony ” The 

rest of her prayer was inarticulate grief. 

Miss Grant for the time being had taken her old post as 
mistress of the house, and Graham gave her Bessie’s message 
when he returned to the dining-room. 

Dr. Grant said : “Not coming down ? she is not ill, I hope. 
I thought her walk seemed to have had the best effect.” 

“ Poor thing ! it’s the first time she’s been out. I was glad 
to see her go even alone,” said Miss Grant. 

“ Ah, but she did not come home alone, you see : a little 
palatable company would work like a charm.” 

“Do you think so? I have tried to get her to come to 
Eastburgh with me for a while ; but she won’t leave this 
house. She seems intent on feeding her grief. The loss 
has been a terrible one to both of us.” 

Here Miss Grant’s voice shook, and she stopped. Barbara 
had slipped from the room when she had heard Bessie’s mes- 
sage. Going upstairs, she knocked at the nursery door. 

“ May I come in ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“Bessie, my darling! you are too much alone. Will you 
not make an effort and come down ? the change will be bene- 
ficial.” 

“ Please, aunt, let me stay. I can be as miserable here as I 
like, and that’s my only comfort.” 

“No, Bessie; comfort will only come when you do your 
duty, and your first duty is submission to the will of God ; it 
was his will to take your husband.” 


BLINDPITS. 


459 


“ I know it, aunt, I know it,” she cried, “ but oh, give me 
time, and I may come to that, but not yet, not yet.” 

“ I daresay you think me unreasonable ; perhaps I am.” 

“ No, aunt, no ; you don’t advise me to do what you haven’t 
done yourself; but I am a poor creature compared with you, 
or with people I have read of. Poor indeed ! ” 

“ I don’t think so ; your grief is natural and proper ; my 
trials have been different, or I have always been compelled to 
active effort through them all; that, I believe, made them 
easier for me, and that is the reason I wish you not to shut 
yourself up alone and brood ; my darling, you’ll injure your 
health.” 

As the doctor and Graham walked back to Heatherburgh 
John said, “ Graham, do you know the terms of my father’s 
will ? ” 

“ I didn’t even know that he jeft a will.” 

u He did, though ; and not only that, but all his business 
matters, books, papers, and everything, in as exact order as if 
he never expected to see them again. Whether they were 
always kept in that order, or whether he had any warning of 
the possibility of death coming on him suddenly, I don’t 
know, but so it was.” John paused a little, and then went 
on — “ I have felt my father’s death pretty acutely, I can tell 
you, although you mayn’t think it.” 

“ 1 never thought otherwise ; I don’t see how you could help 
feeling it.” 

11 Well, he and I differed on many subjects ; it was hardly 
to be expected that I was to pin my opinions to his, simply 
because he happened to be my father ; and then his mar- 
riage ” 

“ He had a perfect right to marry,” said Graham, warmly. 

u I am not going to say anything more about it now ; but I 
fully expected from his infatuation, that he would have cut 
me off with a shilling. I was, consequently, agreeably disap- 
pointed ; he has left to me exactly the half of what he got 
from Miss Boston, the other half to his daughter ; everything 
else to his widow. I can tell you, she’s not exactly penniless ; 


460 


BLINDPITS. 


even were she older and uglier than she is, she has quite 
enough to attract fools ; so I prophesy she won’t retire to a 
convent.” 

“ John, has the grief of that girl no power to touch you ? ” 

“ Well, you know, I’m a good deal among grief, and it’s 
difficult to get up enthusiasm about one’s stepmother.” 

Graham’s nature recoiled. “ I suppose it is human nature 
to harden with custom ; hut at times do you not feel a sweep 
of tenderness play upon your heart-strings, enough to take in 
the human race ? ” 

“ When are you going to publish ? ” 

“ What do you mean ? ” 

" Oh, a volume of quiet, tender, thoughtful essays, such as 
are so popular in these days ; or poems indicative of fine 
fancy and feeling. Stick to the essays, they’ll sell best. 
Tenderness ! — what tenderness do you expect a man to dig 
about and dung that’s rung up at all hours, and must serve — 
I can’t tell how many — summonses before he gets his accounts 
paid ? Why, Miss Stark, who is always, as Mrs. Ainslie says, 
pottering at benevolence, told me a moving story of a woman 
who was ill, and asked me to go and see her. I went, not 
once, but frequently, till I set her on her legs again ; and as, 
of course, she was perfectly destitute, I sent in my account to 
Miss Stark. A hawk in a dovecot could not have excited 
more commotion ; she never for a moment expected a doctor’s 
account. I said, “ I did not know what she expected, hut I 
always expected to he paid by the person who employed me.’ ” 

“ And she paid you ? ” 

“ She couldn’t help it.” 

“ But they are good little women, after their kind, the 
Misses Stark.” 

wager they’ll think twice before they try such another 
benevolent action.” 

“ You are right, you might have dealt more gently ; when 
Miss Stark took time to think, I am sure she would he quite 
ready to pay you.” 

“ Any way, I suspect they found it a ‘ dear sweep of tender- 


BLINDPITS. 


461 


ness, to use a phrase from the thoughtful and delightful bit 
of writing.” 

il I am sure Mary was vexed, if she knew about it.” 

“ But she did not know, unless these little chattering women 
told her; the fact is, the more you can keep women in the 
dark about most things the better.” 

Graham pitied Mary, and it is possible that Mary some- 
times felt herself an object of pity, hut as possibly not, for 
unquestionably she loved her husband, and love makes such 
large allowances, and sees things in such a different light, that 
what to an outside person may appear an unhappy marriage, 
may not he by any means so unhappy after all, and vice versa. 
Besides, John Grant perhaps didn’t paint himself any better 
than he was, and he liked to tease Graham. But Graham 
did not regret that his stay with the doctor had come to a 
close ; and that he had promised to transfer himself to Blind- 
pits, and become the guest of Miss Barclay, during the last 
few days of his stay in the district. 


CHAPTER LXIII. 


And now Barbara was in comfortable circumstances. The 
laborious life was over, tbe foul blot was cleared from her 
name, and she had a good share of wealth, and what is called 
“ position.” Undoubtedly there are people whom these things 
will satisfy — the things, apart from the use that is made of 
them. They had not satisfied Miss Boston. Theoretically 
she despised them. However, she would have been an un- 
happier woman than she was if she had not had them ; but 
then Miss Boston had been a woman of an ill-balanced mind, 
or at least temper. She had been in the habit of stripping 
life to the core, and of asking cui bono? Barbara Barclay 
was not subject to moods and tenses ; she had a well-balanced 
mind, and duty was the back-bone of her action. How then 
did comfortable circumstances affect her ? Graham had pic- 
tured her very contented, now that she had made the fair 
haven ; managing her little principality and her benevolent 
enterprises with the same even kindliness and conscientious 
attention she had exercised while working for daily bread, and 
finding her happiness in doing so. How that he was under 
her roof, and had time and opportunity, or rather used them 
— for hitherto he had been pre-occupied by the events re- 
corded — he observed a change in Miss Barclay. There was 
about her a species of unrest wholly foreign to her — to his 
idea of her. She started at slight noises, trifles annoyed her, 
and often she would lie down on a sofa in a kind of listless 
state. 

Possibly the ordeal she had passed through with apparent 


BLINDPITS. 


463 


impunity was telling on her now ; the dark bushy flower, tied 
to its stick, was evidently drooping. Sturdy independence in 
women Graham did not care for ; hut weakness — meaning by 
weakness the pretty necessity for a lean — always touched him, 
as it does most men. His interest in Barbara, which had 
melted a good deal under the influence of distance and her 
highly correct letters, began to gather again. One day, as he 
sat reading, and Barbara was resting on the sofa, he heard her 
yawn wearily. He shut his hook, and looking across, said — 
“ Mrs. Dods used to say — 

Gauntin’ is wantin’ 

Ane o’ things three, 

Sleep, meat, or makin’ o’. 

Which o’ them want ye ? ” 

t( It must he the last,” said Barbara, “ for of the two others 
I have certainly enough and to spare.” 

“ Then we must begin, and put you through a course of 
it.” 

“ I don’t know what you would do ; besides, it would sit 
awkwardly on me. I’ve never been accustomed to it.” 

Ho, she hadn’t. Graham knew that. 

“ I would think you would be a good deal looked up to 
here,” he said. 

“ That’s a different thing from being loved.” 

“ Miss Barclay, you don’t suppose you are not loved ! ” 

“I was not forming any supposition on the subject,” she 
said, in a tone that forbade any farther probing ; and Graham 
colored in spite of himself, remembering the foolish scene after 
the fever. 

“ Don’t you take kindly to being landed proprietor ? ” 

“ Sometimes I do.” 

" You don’t know how Mary Grant envies you your means 
and your unshackled freedom in doing good.” ' 

11 Does she ? It is an uphill business doing good ; and the 
more means and appliances you have, it really seems the hard- 
er. The little I was able to do in Ironburgh appeared to have 
better and truer results than anything I have done since I 
came here.” 


464 


BLINDPITS. 


11 Perhaps it does not do so well to make a business of it. 
Business implies mind and machinery, and can go on withoul 
heart.” 

u Very probably you are right. I’ve been in error some- 
how ; ” and Barbara sighed. In Berwick Street sighing and 
yawning were nearly unknown to her. 

“ I did not mean that,” said Graham. “ I was only speak- 
ing in general. Couldn’t you get Bessie to come and stay 
here, and take an interest in any of your plans ? It would do 
you both good.” 

“ Poor Bessie ! ” she said, and the tears rose in her eyes ; 
“ if I could have saved her from suffering, at whatever expense 
to myself, how happy it would have made me. I worked hard 
for years to make her way smooth ; and see what has been the 
end — disappointment and grief. Mr. ' Grant kept her up 
through all my distress ; hut I, who for years had no thought 
hut her welfare, have no power to comfort her now.” 

“ I’m sure you are mistaken, Miss Barclay. I don’t doubt 
Bessie feels the very atmosphere round you soothing. You 
couldn’t expect that she shouldn’t feel Mr. Grant’s death 
deeply.” 

“ I didn’t expect it. It hasn’t been my habit to cherish un- 
reasonable expectations.” 

“Nor was it your habit to look at the dark side. I believe 
} r ou are bilious,” he said, smiling in her face. “ You should 
ask advice from MYicar.” 

Barbara rose and went away, and in her own room hurst 
into tears. She was certainly shaken, now that the strain 
was over. She had got into wonderfully comfortable circum- 
stances, and like the shirt of Hessus they looked passing fair, 
hut there was poison in the texture. Perhaps if she had 
stepped into them without such a horrible convulsion on the 
threshold, it might have been different, and she might have 
stood up against prosperity as well as she had, done against 
adversity. 

But it turned out, after all, that her nerves were not quite 
made of iron, and the necessity for exertion being over, her 


BLINDPITS. 


465 


energy flagged. Now that she wanted the tonic of regular 
and necessary work, both her mental and spiritual system got 
out of order. There are some people who can stand a great 
deal of ease ; she was not one of them ; the comforts round 
her began to lose their taste ; she felt as if she were of no use 
in the world. She believed that her mother even preferred 
Miss Dobbie’s company to hers, and there was some truth in 
this. Mrs. Barclay had always rather stood in awe of what 
she thought the austere unbending nature of Barbara’s virtue, 
and Miss Dobbie was a simple obliging creature who did what 
she was bidden as long as it was nothing wrong. Then some 
of her efforts at doing good had miscarried, and that had 
affected her in a way which at one time would have been 
impossible, which would only have made her try again the 
more unflinchingly. And Bessie had gone away, carrying 
with her, or tossing back as valueless, her very heartstrings ; 
and now her dead husband was infinitely more to her than 
she was, who had loved and cherished her from a child, and 
Graham laughed at her, and advised her to consult the doctor. 

The worst of it was that Barbara knew she was weak and 
unreasonable, that she was morbid. As she sat alone she 
asked w r hy her life could not flow on as it used to do ? why, 
although she had lost what had hitherto been its object, the 
doing of good should not be a higher and more satisfactory 
end ? 

Having advanced so far, has Barbara’s character been made 
clear enough to make it unnecessary to say that she was not 
a poor creature in all this ? While she had worked for her 
household she had had an honest legitimate pride and enjoyr 
ment in it, although often dashed with anxiety, and she had 
done what good her time and means allowed in a humble 
kindly spirit, but it has never been hinted that she had a 
world-wide philanthropy. Her strange experience after Miss 
Boston’s death had widened her sympathies somewhat; the 
reaction of public opinion after her innocence was so fully 
proved, somewhat more ; but hers was a concentrated nature. 
She was consoled for Mr. Grant’s death, by the thought which 
20 * 


466 


BLINDPITS. 


at once and naturally occurred to her, that Bessie would come 
back, and they would he as they had been before ; hut Bessie 
declined this. She must stay in the home where at least the 
ghost of her brief unclouded happiness was. Being thus 
bitterly disappointed, and in very easy circumstances, Bar- 
bara’s heart failed her for the first time in her life. No one 
loved her except in a sort of third-rate degree, which made 
them gracious in accepting kind offices for which she was to 
expect no return ; and she had nothing in the world to hinder 
her dwelling on this idea but her own good sense, which also 
treacherously failed her. But it was true, she had always 
ministered, and now in her hour of weakness there was never 
a creature to say, Be of good cheer ! Which of her intimate 
friends imagined that the independent prompt Barbara, after 
having ridden out the storm, and having been moored in the 
bay of peace and plenty, found herself lonely, miserable, and 
morbid ? Not one. Graham supposed her bilious ; but next 
morning she seemed well and he thought no more of it : 
Barbara could keep her weakness under lock and key. After 
dinner she was on the sofa again, taking the rest which, now 
that she did no manner of exhausting work, had become 
almost necessary to her, and Graham was staring into the fire, 
thinking of the solitary inhabitant of Grantsburn — Grants- 
burn, the place every nook of which had been familiar to him 
since boyhood. How strange to think that now the old- 
fashioned child, who but a few years since had amused him in 
Berwick Street, was sitting there, its widowed mistress ! He 
would have visited her daily if he had dared, but he did not 
dare ; he must wait till time smoothed his way, and he could 
wait any length of time, even as Jacob waited for Bachel. 
Would his waiting be all in vain ? If it was, why then — but 
before he had quite made up his mind what should happen, 
Miss Dobbie came in and said in a slightly mysterious way — 

“ There is Mr. Goldie coming in at the gate.” 

“ Is there anything very remarkable in that ? ” asked 
Barbara, with what seemed to Graham a tinge of sharpness in 
her tone. 


BLINDPITS. 


4G7 


" Nothing ! — oh, nothing ! ” said Miss Dobbie, apologeti- 
cally ; “ but I thought you might like to know.” 

“ I have always quite sufficient patience to wait till visitors 
are announced in the regular way, Miss Dobbie.” 

“ Who is Mr. Goldie ? ” asked Graham. 

11 He is the new tenant of my fai'm,” said Barbara. 

“ He is a grocer in the High Street of Middleburgli,” said 
Mrs. Barclay, who had appeared from her private sitting- 
room as Graham asked the question. “A grocer,” she 
repeated ; “ but a very decent man,” and she fixed her eyes on 
Barbara. 

“ He may,” said Miss Dobbie, “ at one period of his life 
have stood behind the counter, and even worn an apron, but I 
believe that latterly ” 

But what Miss Dobbie believed was not revealed, as at that 
moment Mr. Goldie entered. Graham looked at him. He 
was not dull enough not to have perceived from the above 
little interlude that something extra of some kind attached to 
Mr. Goldie. Mr. Goldie was middle-sized; autumn had set 
mildly in among his hair and beard; his face was what Mrs. 
Dods would have called a public face — that is, it was like a 
great many faces you see every day — only the expression 
saved it from being very common property, and made it Ins 
own. His speech and manners were rather stiff and precise, 
but he might be feeling not quite at ease, as Mrs. Barclay had 
become very dignified, and shook hands with him rather drily. 
Miss Dobbie leant also to the dignified side ; and, what sur- 
prised Graham, Miss Barclay even, was not quite her ordinary 
self. 

Graham threw himself into the breach. He had recognised 
the visitor at once. “You and I have not met before, Mr. 
Goldie ; but I once studied your face for two days in a way to 
get it by heart.” 

“ Perhaps,” said Mr. Goldie, glancing slightly at Barbara, 
u it’s as well to forget these things.” 

“ If we could. But I would know any of these twelve 
men if I were to meet them on the furthest verge of the green 


468 


BLINDPITS. 


earth. We were deeply indebted to you I know, and Miss 
Barclay knows.” 

“ I was glad to be of service to her.” 

There was a pause ; that time came up very vividly. 

“ You live in Middleburgh ? ” said Graham. 

“0 yes!” said Mrs. Barclay. “We occasionally drive 
through Middleburgh, and I have observed the name over 
the door — £ Alexr. Goldie, grocer/ ” 

“ I ? ve lived there for many years, in the house above the 
shop ; in fact, I’m there still. But I have begun to build 
outside the town, and I expect to remove in a few months.” 

Then Graham, to make conversation, asked into the plans 
of the buildings, and got in detail the number of rooms, the 
ventilation, the water-supply, the baths, the three acres of 
ground on which, it stood, etc. 

“And when you have got the building done,” said Gra- 
ham, “ the ladies .of your family will come in for their share 
of work in the furnishing and laying out of the garden.” 

“ I have no ladies in my family except my good old mother, 
and I’m concerned how she will bear transplanting. She 
encourages me, but it’s for my sake, not for her own. How- 
ever, if she doesn’t like it we’ll go back to our old quarters.” 

“The new place will let easily at a pretty high figure.” 
Mr. Goldie had a sharp eye for a bargain. 

Barbara spoke very little — not more than her position as 
mistress of the house called for. Graham wondered Mr. Goldie 
did not get his business, whatever it was, done, and go ; but 
he seemed in no hurry ; and when he did go, it did not tran- 
spire that he had any business at all. 

Barbara proceeded to make tea. As she handed Graham 
his cup, she said — 

“How then what do you think of Mr. Goldie ? ” 

“ How think ? ” 

“ What’s your opinion of him ? ” 

“ I hardly have an opinion of any one I’ve seen only once. 
One thing, he is good-natured. If the ladies of a house 
had all been as dry to me as you were to him, I would have 
cut my visit short.” 


BLINDPITS. 


469 


“ Was I dry ? ” said Barbara. 

“ You wouldn’t be aware of it ? ” 

“ No ; I should be sorry if Mr. Goldie went away with that 
impression.” 

“ It’s the best impression he could have,” said Mrs. Bar- 
clay ; “ but I am afraid he wouldn’t see it. A man of that 
kind can’t judge of these things as a gentleman can.” 

“Mr. Goldie is a gentleman, mother — if good sense and 
good feeling make a gentleman.” 

“ And a fine house, with water ‘ laid on,’ and a ventilating 
apparatus. The lower orders can make money do a good 
deal ; but it can’t give the habits of a gentleman.” 

“ Nonsense ! ” said Graham ; “ they are much better with- 
out the habits of some gentlemen, at any rate.” 

“ If he would brush his teeth,” suggested Miss Bobbie, 
mildly. 

“ His class don’t do that,” replied Mrs. Barclay. “ They 
let them grow as green as ditch-water. Don’t speak of it 
especially when we are at tea, Miss Dobbie.” 

“ His teeth are good,” said Graham ; “ so good that I con- 
cluded they were only his by right of purchase.” 

“You are wrong there; they are his own,” said Miss Bar- 
clay. 

“Barbara,” retorted her mother, “how do you know that? 
Did he pick a bone with them the day he dined here ? ” 

“ That’s the true way to enjoy a bone,” said Graham. “ I 
often give myself a treat of that kind. It is one of the few 
sweets of savage life that a poor creature in narrow lodgings 
can get at. I can neither have feathers, nor paint, nor war- 
dance, nor hunting-ground ; but I can take my bone in my 
fingers, and make it as clean as a bit of ivory. And why 
shouldn’t I?” 

“ 0 Mr. Graham ! ” said Miss Dobbie. 

« 0 yes, Miss Dobbie, the society of cultivated ladies may 
make a man forego wild savage tricks of that kind but noth- 
ing else.” 

“ I suspect Mr. Goldie has not enjoyed much of the society 
of cultivated ladies,” said Mrs. Barclay. 


470 


BLIXDPITS. 


“ Then the pleasure will he the greater when he does,” said 
Graham. 

“ His mother is a very estimable old lady,” Barbara said. 
“He asked me to go upstairs and see her one day when I was 
in the shop.” 

“ And did she dust a chair with the comer of her apron, 
and ask you kindly to sit down ? ” asked Mrs. Barclay. 

“ She has been a good mother to a good son,” said Barbara 
with slight emphasis. 


CHAPTER LXIV. 


Before Graham left, Mrs. Barclay seized an opportunity 
of having a private interview with him. The preamble was 
studied; she began, “You know, Graham, that our friends, I 
mean our intimate gentlemen friends, are few indeed ; unless 
yourself, 'I don’t know a single one. You know all our outs 
and ins : how we were buried in Ironburgh so long ; how Bar- 
bara was a comfort to us there. After we came here I thought 
my trials were to he over, and that I should end my days in 
peace. But no; Bessie must throw herself away on a man 
old enough to he her father, and now she’s killing herself with 
grief for his death ; hut she is still very young, and no doubt 
will get over it. What is her trial to mine, when her grand- 
papa died, the companion of more than a score of years, and I 
was left helpless with a family ? My grief was for life, but 
Bessie’s will exhaust itself before long.” 

Graham listened with all his ears. He thought she was 
going to chalk out Bessie’s future. What was she going to 
say to him about it ? 

“ At least, poor thing ! I hope so,” she went on. “ You 
know how we were left by Miss Boston, of course ? ” 

Graham said he didn’t, further than that part of her money 
was left to them. 

“Very well then, Barbara Boston, for what reason she 
knew best, had a spite at me, and she left me nearly depen- 
dent on Barbara. That, of course, is anything but pleasant, 
but while Barbara remains as she is it is not of vital impor^ 
tance.” 


472 


BLINDPITS. 


“I should think not, indeed. What is she going to do hut 
remain as she is ? ” 

“ She might marry.” 

“ She might, but she won’t,” said Graham decidedly. “ I 
have heard such reports since I came here, hut if I know 
Miss Barclay, and I know her pretty well, she won’t marry 
any of the men I have heard mentioned. She can see round 
a oorner ; you may set your mind at rest.” 

“ You think you know Barbara, but she is exactly at the 
time of life when women who have been more than usually 
sensible all along do the most foolish things.” 

“ I don’t know about that ; if Miss Barclay were to do a 
foolish thing I would never presume to pass an opinion on a 
human being agam.” 

“ And there are men, or at least a man, about whom there 
has been no report.” 

" Who is that ? ” 

“ Didn’t you hear her say she had been to see his mother ? ” 

“Mr. Goldie? — nonsense. I thought she was barely civil 
to him last evening.” 

“ Don’t tell me ! I sicken when I think of it. I shall be 
turned out of this house to starve on a pittance ! ” 

“ Stop, Mrs. Barclay ; did your daughter toil so long and so 
manfully that you should doubt her now ? he asked warmly, 
feeling her selfishness and her injustice to Barbara. “ What- 
ever she does, she’ll not forget her duty to her mother.” 

“ But she’ll be swayed by him and by his mother, and peo- 
ple of that stamp have the narrowest ideas. To think of Bar- 
bara marrying a grocer ! — a grocer ! ” 

“ I can’t sympathise with you, Mrs. Barclay ; I have no re- 
pugnance to a grocer, as a grocer. Why shouldn’t a man do 
with his might whatever his hands find to do, in the grocery 
line or any other ? ” 

“ But you admit that some kinds of work are more honor- 
able than others.” 

“ It depends on the worker, not on the work.” 

“ Then you will not help me ? ” 


BLINDPITS. 


473 


“ To do what ? ” 

“ To make Barbara ashamed of her lover.” 

" Because he is a grocer? decidedly not, if he is her lover, 
which I don’t believe.” 

“ Barbara has money.” 

“ And Miss Barclay is capable of knowing whether it is 
herself or her money that is wanted.” 

“ You have lived a very short time in the world,” said Mrs. 
Barclay with a deep sigh ; “ you have neither a mother’s 
heart nor eyes.” 

Mrs. Barclay withdrew to persecute her unfailing devotee, 
Miss Dobbie, who had a poor time of it between her love for 
Miss Barclay and her sympathy for her mother. 

Miss Barclay and Graham generally had the time between 
dinner and tea to themselves, and in the very quiet way which 
has been indicated enjoyed the gloaming in the interval. But 
next afternoon, Graham rose and made the gas blaze up, and, 
as it did so, looked down on Barbara’s face, on which the 
light fell fully, and remarked in an off-hand way — 

“ When I was out this afternoon I had a walk with yotfr 
tenant ; does he drive over every day ? ” 

“ Every day ? ” said Barbara, somewhat startled ; “ I don’t 
know, I suppose he does.” 

“He’s right to look well after his affairs. I found him 
rather an intelligent man.” 

“ Indeed ! was there any insuperable obstacle to his being 
intelligent ? ” 

Graham was amused. He was good, hut you’ll hear in 
mind that he had fallen with Adam in his first transgression ; 
and he was quite wicked and curious enough to illuminate the 
room before he opened up his subject ; and impudent enough 
to feel amused when he began to think he had evidence that 
Mrs. Barclay’s surmise was correct. It was not very wicked 
either, for, deep and mysterious as life is, it must have been 
intended that we should seize the bubbles on the surface and 
play with them, or man would not have been made a laughing 
animal. 


474 


BLINDPITS. 


“ 01), no obstacle that I know of, only every man you meet 
is not intelligent. Mr. Goldie has been on the Continent, and 
has come back with his pockets stuffed with information ; he 
made me feel ashamed of myself.” 

Barbara was playing diligently with t?ie tassel of the sofa- 
cushion ; there was a gratified smile on her face, and she was 
delightfully unconscious of the process she was undergoing. 

“And he was not nearly so stiff and peculiar to-day; 
indeed, he wasn’t that at all.” 

“ Stiff and peculiar ! I was not aware of any stiffness and 
peculiarity about him.” 

“ Ah, but you are not so good at seeing as I am ; you are 
not aware that you hardly spoke to him yesterday. I really 
felt for the man ; I don’t dislike him at all, and I wonder that 
you do ; I am sure there is nothing repulsive about him.” 

“ Repulsive ! ” exclaimed Miss Barclay, and she dropped 
the tassel, “ I daresay ! What are you thinking about ? ” 

“You think it too strong a word, perhaps, to apply to Mr. 
Goldie. I am glad of that, but I was afraid you might not. 
If I had been quite sure that you did not think him in any 
way repulsive, I would have brought him in to-day ; it would 
be as well for you to be on good terms with your tenant.” 

“ You might have brought him in ; but it’s of no conse- 
quence. If you meet him again, perhaps you’ll remember 
that I don’t consider him in any way repulsive ” — with a little 
indignant tone. 

“ He asked me to go to his house ; do you think it would 
be worth while ? ” 

“You may judge of that yourself,” said Barbara drily. 
“ I should think his society more profitable than that of John 
Grant, or Tom Ainslie, or others of that set you frequent.” 

“Their social position is a little different, you know.” 
Barbara glanced up quickly, and Graham thought he had 
overdone his part, and that she was suspecting him, and he 
went on — “ I don’t mind that, but you are, or used to be, a 
little of a conservative.” 

“Yes. I never undervalued social standing; but social 


BUNDBITS. 


475 


standing without the goodness that should accompany it is a 
poor thing ; the goodness without the social standing will 
always command respect, at least mine.” 

“ Mr. Goldie is respectable ; ‘ he keeps a gig.’ ” 

This allusion, as a matter of course, was thrown away on 
Barbara; the cunning of the hand that winged that shaft 
always seemed foolishness to her ; she could make nothing of 
it. 

“ I’ll give him a visit. I’ll come down upon him in the 
course of the winter with my agricultural chemistry, and let 
him see I know something at any rate.” 

“ When you have finished your classes, what do you intend 
to do then ? ” 

“ Turn farmer.” 

“ Really ; how I wish you had got Mr. Grant’s place.” 

“ I was offered it.” 

“ And did not take it ? ” she said, in surprise. 

“No; there were many reasons. I haven’t Mr. Grant’s 
tact. I am apt to say what I think. I should probably have 
told the Marquis some day that he was a blockhead, or if a 
farmer had disregarded my advice I would have told him he 
was an ass.” 

“ You would have done no such things.” 

“Very well; I felt it did not suit me. I might try com- 
merce, and make a fortune or lose one ; I have no ambition to 
do either ; in fact, I have no worldly ambition. I shall take a 
farm and vegetate. I don’t mean to live quite for myself 
either, although I may not ^ sit like the open-handed hours 
and shower down blessings.’ There are people everywhere, 
and I may be of some benefit to my fellow creatures. That’s 
my plan ; it has the merit of simplicity.” 

“ You’ll marry, will you not ? ” 

“ I don’t know. Do you think a single life best, Miss 
Barclay ? ” 

“ I’m not sure. I used to think so, at least in some cases ; 
but the Creator knows best, and he has planted men in 
families.” 


476 


BLINDPITS. 


“And what’s brought you over to the Creator’s way of 
thinking ? ” said Graham wickedly. 

“ I don’t consider that a reverent way of speaking. That’s 
the way Bessie and you used to get on in Berwick Street. I 
wonder if she will ever recover her boundless spirits again ? ” 

“ Surely,” said Graham, suddenly sobered. He had had his 
little bit of practice on Miss Barclay, and enjoyed it; but 
there his enjoyment stopped; there was not a creature to 
whom he could communicate it. 

Once on a time, in Berwick Street, he had been accustomed 
to carry all his fine impalpable jokes to Bessie, and she com- 
prehended everything like a flash of lightning ; no need of 
clumsy explanations or breaking down into bits. Since then 
he had had no quick sympathy. Would it ever be his 
again ? ” 

Miss Barclay spoke of his marrying. “ Does she sup- 
pose,” thought he, “ that I am going to look about for a wife 
as I would for a farm, and when I see a suitable one make an 
offer?” No doubt the bare notion of Bessie’s marrying 
again could not occur to her ; and how she would be shocked 
if he were to hint his hopes, and naturally so, he instinctively 
felt. He went back to Eastburgh, having seen nothing more 
of Bessie than the skirt of her gown disappearing at the 
church-door. But it was something to be once more under 
the same roof with her ; nor did the knowledge of that blight 
his devoutness, rather it deepened the feeling. 


CHAPTER LXV. 

In the course of the winter Graham was in Ironburgh, and, 
although it lay far out of his way, he did not forget to call on 
his old friends in Berwick-Street. When he rang the hell he 
expected to see one of the old familiar forms, either the lordly 
hulk of Mrs. Dods, surmounted by her fresh-colored face, or 
the thin shrunken frame of the ex-baker, with his head 
tremulously drooping at the end of his long lean neck ; hut a 
stranger — a stoutish, coarsisli-looking woman — answered his 
summons, and surveyed him with good-natured curiosity. 
That there could be any change in the house had not occurred 
to him. 

“ Is Mr. or Mrs. Dods in ? ” he said. 

“ Wha is’t that speerin’ for them ?” she asked, making no 
motion to admit him. 

“ Richardson,” he said, impatiently ; “ my name is Rich- 
ardson.” 

“ Come in, sir ; 99 and she showed him into his old sitting- 
room. “ You’ll he the lodger I’ve heard them speak o’ ? 99 
she w^nt on. “ Weel, sir, ye’ll he vexed to hear that my 
auntie was buried yesterday.” 

“ Buried ! — Mrs. Dods, you mean. Is it possible ? ” 

“ Ay, sir, it was unco sudden ; and, as Mr. Pettigrew says, 
a warnin’ to us a’ ” 

(l Dead ! ” said Graham, not heeding her words. “ And 
the old man — can I see him ? ” 

“ It was apoplexy,” she continued, " and very sudden. 
She just fell down in the kitchen. My uncle, ye ken, is no 


478 


BLINDPITS. 


much to count on when there’s onything ado ; hut Mr. Petti- 
grew ran for the doctor, and somebody sent for me ; and I 
have aye been here since, and I’m gaun to bide, no that it’s 
very convenient, but what is the auld man to do his lane ? 
But, as I was saying, Mr. Pettigrew brought the doctor ; but 
what can doctors do when the time’s come ? However, it’s 
but right to mak’ use o’ the means — it saves backcasts j but 
my auntie, poor woman ! w r as ayont the powder o’ man ” 

“ Will you tell Mr. Dods I’m here ? ” 

“ I’ll do that, sir. He’s gotten a gey bit shake. He was 
aye a kind o’ silly body. I little thought he wad outlive my 
auntie ; but’ ane never kens. But what’ll ye tak’ ? Ye’ll 
tak’ something ? ” and she went to the press in the room, and 
set a bottle, w r ith glasses, and water, and biscuits, which had 
no doubt been part of the funeral meats, on the table. “ He’s 
gey silly, as I was sayin’ ” 

“ Can I see him ? ” said Graham once more. “ I have not 
much time. Just tell him I’m here, will you ?” 

“ I’ll do that, sir 3 ” and she left the room, but came back 
behind Mr. Dods. 

Graham rose to meet him, and they shook hands in silence. 

The young woman kept lifting the things on the table, and 
setting them down again. “That’ll do, Janet,” said the old 
man at last ; “ that’ll do, the gentleman and me ’ill manage ; ” 
and, however reluctantly, Janet took the hint, and disap- 
peared. 

“ Oh, man,” said Mr. Dods, “ this has been a sair business 
— a sair business ! ” 

“ I’m sure of it,” said Graham, feelingly 3 “ but there has 
been mercy in it too. She seems to have had no suffering.” 

“ Ho, no ; she never was conscious frae the minute she fell. 
I often thought she would some day be left a widow to fend 
for hersel’, but it’s better as it is. Better that the weaker 
vessel should be ta’en first.” 

Graham could hardly forbear a smile. “Yes,” he said, 
“ that’s some consolation.” 

“ Ay, but it’s a wonderful change. How I miss her ! Eh, 
how I miss her ! I’ll never wun ower’t.” 


BLIXDPITS 


479 


“Time does much, Mr. Dods,” Graham said, soothingly; 
“ and your niece seems a good-natured girl.” 

“Oh, ay; she’s weel aneuch if she hadna sic a tongue. 
My wife could speak, but she spoke sense in the general ; but 
that lassie and Pettigrew haver frae mornin’ to night.” 

“ Is Pettigrew to remain ? ” asked Graham. 

“Weel, yes; ye ken she aye wad keep him, and I canna 
turn him out now — I canna do it ! ” and the old man’s voice 
broke. 

“ Have you been doing anything in poetry of late ? ” asked 
Graham. 

“No muckle, no muckle. I was thinking o’ making some- 
thing to her memory.” 

“You should do that. It would occupy your mind and 
soothe your sorrow; and she deserves it.” 

“ You may say that, sir — you may say that. She was nae 
ordinar woman. Her balance o’ mind was clean ayont the 
common. I mind that struck me when I fell in wi’ her first ; 
and when at last she kent she was to get me, she was in no- 
wise uplifted.” 

“Was she not?” said Graham, gravely; “she had great 
good sense.” 

“ But for a’ that, she had her weak bits, that 1 couldna help 
seeing. There was nae getting her to comprehend some 
things. Por instance, she had a habit, since ever I kent her, 
o’ aye keeping the biggest penny-piece she fell in wi’ through 
the week to put in the plate on Sabbath. Weel, I never 
could bring her to understand, or at least to act on the under- 
standing, that a wee penny just gaed as far as a big ane. 
The very morning she de’ed she had her big penny laid on 
the drawers’-head a’ ready ; ” and the old voice grew thick and 
tremulous again ; “ hut thae hits o’ things were just sae muckle 
part and parcel o’ hersel’, that she couldna been hersel’ with- 
out them, and even silly things lay their grip on ane’s heart, 
and the grip tightens at a time like this.” 

If Graham had had less true respect and sympathy for the 
old man’s grief, he would have said, “Embody that idea in 


480 


BLINDPITS. 


your poem, Mr. Dods ; ” but be couldn't at that moment, 
although he was aware there would he nothing so true or nat- 
ural in Mr. Dods’ verses, or they would be different from any 
of them that he had seen. 


CHAPTER LXVI. 


When Graham was home, and sitting by Miss Grant at her 
fireside, he recounted to her his day’s adventures. He gen- 
erally did ; he was fond of feminine society, and every woman 
with whom he had lived in the same house liked him, and 
made a point of attending lovingly to his wants. He told her 
of Mrs. Hods death, and said, “ When you are writing to Mrs. 
Grant you’ll tell her of it.” 

“ Why, she’s here,” said Miss Grant ; “ I forgot to mention 
it. She came in the afternoon, and, as she seemed wearied, I 
advised her to go early to bed. You’ll see her in the morn- 
ing.” 

“Here !” said Graham ; “has she been here all the even- 
ing ? ” 

“ Yes,” said Miss Grant, surprised at the tone of his voice ; 
“ there is nothing remarkable in that.” 

“ She hasn’t been visiting of late. How is she ? Hoes she 
look well ? ” 

“ She looks pale ; still, she is in wonderful spirits, consider- 
ing. Ah ! she can hardly be expected to miss my brother as 
I do who was so long with him. Young people soon get over 
things.” 

“ So people say. I hope it may be so in her case.” 

“ I wouldn’t like my brother soon forgotten.” 

Graham was silent. He was thinking, “ If I had known 
she was here I would have been home hours ago.” 

When he went into the sitting-room next morning Bessie’s 
slight black figure was standing in the window. She wore a 
21 


482 


BLINDPITS. 


widow’s cap ; and he thought he had never seen anything so 
ridiculously out of place. She turned round and came to 
meet him, smiling. “ I should have waited for you last night, 
Graham ; hut I was a good child, and went to bed as I was 
hidden.” 

“ I hope you feel rested? ” he said awkwardly. “ 1 hardly 
knew you with that — thing on your head ; ” and then he 
colored, feeling he had made an unfeeling blunder. 

“ My cap ? — I didn’t think of wearing it at all ; but I put 
it on when I appear in public. Aunt said I must; that is the 

custom, and marked the respect I had for . 0 Graham, 

you know that dress and words are both idle to tell my loss. 
But,” she went on, with a smile on her pale face that again 
reminded him of sunshine on snow, “though aunt doesn’t sit 
on forms now, she still stands on ceremonies.” 

“ Does she ? I thought she had relaxed a little.” 

" She glanced at him after her old fashion. “ How came you 
to suspect ? ” she said. 

“ Perhaps a bird of the air carried the matter.” 

“ Miss Grant, Graham has heard, it seems, of what I was 
telling you yesterday.” 

“ Have you ? ” said Miss Grant. “ How is it that you 
never mentioned it ? ” 

“ Mentioned what ? I had nothing to mention ; merely an 
airy nothing, that would have evaporated in speech.” 

“ Grandmamma doesn’t think it an airy nothing, nor do I 
now.” 

“ I am glad to hear it — really glad to hear it.” 

“ Are you ? If I thought it would make aunt happier 

But I doubt that.” 

“ Do you ? Owing to the paternal interest I take in Miss 
Barclay, I visited Mr. Goldie, and made inquiries about him 
in a quiet way, and I think he may be trusted to make her 
happy.” 

“ They are so different, aunt always seemed so complete and 
independent ; and now that she is in such comfortable circum- 
stances 1 must say it was some time before I believed it.” 


BLTXDPITS. 


483 


u 1 didn’t quite take it in at first either.” 

“ Grandmamma is in a bad way about it. If he had only 
been a gentleman, she says ; but a man who sends letters in 
big blue envelopes, addressed in a great round commercial 
hand ; and has even, she says, sent dirty newspapers, tied up 
with a bit of twine ; and Miss Dobbie says he calls everything 
‘ first-rate.’ Now aunt is punctilious, you know, and, though 
really humble, values herself on being a gentlewoman by 
descent and habit.” 

“ There are spots in the sun,” said Graham ; “ but he is 
first-rate at giving light and heat for all that.” 

“For my part,” said Miss Grant; “I have long given up 
being astonished at anything in the shape of a marriage.” 

“If it bad been any one but aunt ; but you understand she 
has never spoken to me of it, nor have I ever seen Mr. Goldie. 
Perhaps it’s only a romance of grandmamma’s after all.” 

“ No ; I am nearly sure it is a romance of Miss Barclay’s. 
The magic ointment has got into her eyes, and she sees a man 
and a grocer as a god walking.” 

“Don’t joke,” said Bessie, warmly. “It is too serious a 
matter for that ; and aunt’s eyes are not of the kind that take 
on magic ointment. She sees Mr. Goldie just as he is, which 
is a comfort to me, for where there is no hallucination there 
can be no disappointment.” 

“ Neither you nor she will be disappointed. Natty habits 
are but the little finishing touches of the guinea’s stamp; 
* the man’s the gowd for a’ that.’ ” 

“ I hope you are right ; I do hope you are right. These 
little things would not weigh with me, but then aunt is so dif- 
ferent, that I wnndered; besides, she always spoke as if her 
plans were laid to the end of the chapter.” 

“ So they might, but a new chapter begins. Do you know 
Mr. Goldie was one of the jurymen — you mind when; and 
but for him things might have gone very differently.” 

“ I did not know ; that may partly account for it ; it is very 
curious.” 

“ Yes, it is. You have not forgotten your old friend Mr. 


484 


BLINDPITS. 


Dods ? and then Graham went on to tell his Berwick Street 
news, which were sad enough, hut there are few events of life 
so tragic that a thread of the comic does not go zigzag through 
them ; and Mr. Dods’ characteristic and innocent self-conceit 
shone like phosphoric points on the dark ground of his grief. 
Bessie almost cried and laughed together, and they were so 
thoroughly hack in old times, that Graham might have been 
tempted to forget the gulf between them, hut for the muslin 
him that covered the head and shadowed the face, that to him 
was the one face in all the world. He was thankful that they 
had met and parted, and he had not betrayed his feelings. 

And Bessie thought much of her aunt — her much- tried and 
beloved aunt, whom it seemed she was about in one sense to 
lose ; she could not feel happy about it, although she reasoned 
she was selfish in not doing so. And she thought, too, of 
the old couple in Berwick Street, who had been such promi- 
nent figures in her young life, and it took her out of herself 
and her all-absorbing grief. It is thus that time pushes back, 
and back, and back a great sorrow, and begins to train the ivy 
of events over the ruins. 


CHAPTEK LXVII. 


Barbara was one day standing in the bowj window she 
had planned and built, looking out on the beds of gay flowers 
she had planted and nursed, and which a night’s hard frost 
had suddenly changed from beauty to rottenness. The 
weather was heavy and lowering, and a sullen sky looked 
down upon her ; it was shortly after Bessie, in answer to her 
proposal that their lives should join again, had said, No ; she 
meant to stay at Grantsburn. She stood idly gazing out, 
morbid and miserable, and ashamed of herself. Why, she 
said, could she not stand alone now, as she had done so many 
years ? She believed she was not well, and yet she was not 
ill. She would begin some regular hard work — something 
that would satisfy her conscience that time was not slipping 
past her unimproved : a charity school, perhaps, to he taught 
by herself. But it was not that exactly ; her nerves had been 
shaken, and her health was beginning to suffer, and although 
she did not know it, she was unconsciously crying out for 
sympathy and support. If Mrs. Barclay had been a different 
kind of mother, she would have got them, or if Miss Dobbie 
had been of sharper mental faculties ; as it was, the person, 
and the only person, who noticed any change, was Katie, who 
had been maid-of-all-work at Berwick Street, and was now 
housemaid at Blindpits. Her quiet sympathy and attention 
sometimes brought the tears to the eyes of her mistress. 
Barbara was decidedly weak at this crisis. 

Mr. Goldie had called on business several times, and he 
called this day. He went up to the window and shook hands 


486 


BLINDPITS. 


with her ; than a sudden interest shot into his eyes, and he 
said, " Miss Barclay, you are not well ; your eyes are heavy 
and” Barbara looked up, and in that moment the oint- 

ment did its work. Mr. Goldie had begun life as a commer- 
cial traveller, but actually, at this crisis, he was at a loss what 
to say, and, accordingly, nothing was said. Then the small 
matter of business he had come about was settled, then some 
sentences of little meaning uttered, and he went on his way, 
having found out, what he did not know when he entered, 
that he was in love with Miss Barclay. Her face had stuck 
in his memory since the bleak afternoon he had travelled in 
the same carriage with her, on her first journey to Blindpits, 
and circumstances had not tended to rub it out ; but till that 
afternoon, when he held her hand in his, he had never thought 
of her as his wife. 

Had he known Barbara as well as we do, he might have 
despaired of success, but he did not ; and down he came like 
a great boulder on a pond of ice, and went crash through it, 
to find a warm temperature beneath — at least that is my 
glacial theory on the subject. Hot that he came, saw, and 
conquered, either; but after that day Barbara lost the power 
of criticism. When a newspaper came in the manner that 
offended Mrs. Barclay, the click of Barbara’s scissors seemed 
gentler as she severed the obnoxious string, and the big blue 
envelopes were finally lost on her ; and, if it were possible, 
the phrase “ first-rate ” came to have a musical sound for her. 
You will think this hardly possible, and I allow it partakes of 
the nature of a miracle. But there is no miracle- worker like 
love. It will give an awkward woman tact, make an impu- 
dent man modest ; and for the humblest pair on earth it 
creates, once in a life-time, a glory which is a shadow of the 
heavenly world. 

I feel to the full the awkwardness of introducing Barbara’s 
husband so near the end of my history; but the truth is I 
never expected her to marry. Her marriage was as great a 
surprise to me as it was to any of her friends. Even in Ber- 
wick Street I have heard Mrs. Dods, when she was wondering 


BLINDPITS. 


487 


in Miss Barclay’s presence why such a woman was not mar- 
ried, catch herself up, and remark “ that the very best women 
were aye left standing,” — by way, I fancy, of solatium to the 
wound she might suppose she had inflicted on Barbara’s feel- 
ings, although, no doubt, Barbara was far from envying Mrs. 
Dods’ matrimonial felicity. Mrs. Dods, poor woman ! did not 
live to rejoice in her friend’s happiness ; she was gone from 
her little world of small cares and vexations, and Berwick 
Street would know her no more for ever. 

I knew nothing of Mr. Goldie till he became a tenant of 
Blindpits. He struck me as being the very type of the good, 
frank, successful man, -with no nonsense about him. He 
might not have the fine breeding of a gentleman, but he had 
the finer breeding that comes from a good heart, without 
which the other is but the japan that in the straits of life will 
rub off and expose the ugly metal below. 

They were married in June, certainty not because of the 
extreme leafiness of that month, but because the villa was 
ready. As may be supposed, they did not go and look at 
lakes and catch cold, but went directly home, and Barbara’s 
tastes were not sufficiently cultivated to make her recoil from 
a spick and span villa. They were not young ; but knowing 
Barbara, as it is hoped you do, and having an idea of Mr. 
Goldie, as it is hoped you have, you will be aware that neither 
of them had the kind of temperament that sits down to cry 
over spilt milk. They set themselves to seize the passing 
moment and make the best of it, which is sound philosophy 
and true religion. Barbara went about doing good with a 
glad heart, which is of itself a cure for many evils, and her 
husband aided and abetted her in its every wish. With some 
surface differences, they were well matched, and she smoothed 
his innocent excrescences insensibly. I have noticed him 
proud of her knowledge of geography, which is indeed accu- 
rate and extensive, considering the general adult mistiness on 
that head, as is her knowledge of historical dates and elemen- 
tary facts in general. You have a notion that their existence 
would be what you call humdrum, have you ? — no, not to 


488 


BLINDPITS. 


them ; and perhaps we had better wait till the crude unfin- 
ished business of life is over, and the sequel appears, before 
we determine what is humdrum. 

Graham and Bessie saw Barbara drive away from Blindpits 
with deep feeling. 

“ I never dreamed aunt would marry,” said Bessie, sinking 
in a chair, and putting her handkerchief to her eyes. 

“ To think of her leaving us,” said Mrs. Barclay, t( for a 
stout elderly grocer, and a very ordinary man — me in my old 
age!” Graham was the only one who saw clearly on the 
subject. He knew Barbara was an ordinary woman, except in 
her laborious, self-sacrificing life (a noble exception), and he 
did not see why she should carry that out to the end. He 
believed in Mr. Goldie thoroughly ; and although Miss Bar- 
clay had a larger corner of his heart, another man having her 
did not require her expulsion from it. He felt remarkably 
comfortable even when he recalled his own proposal after the 
fever. Miss Dobbie silently shed tears. Much as she leaned 
on the wisdom of Miss Barclay, she was afraid, in the lan- 
guage of her late excellent friend Miss Davie, that she had 
thrown herself away. Mrs. Barclay stood the parting from 
her daughter wonderfully well. Barbara had made liberal 
provision for her mother. She was left at Blindpits monarch 
of all she surveyed, except the swallows. She rose to the 
occasion and enjoyed it. Her uncertain health became very 
certain j she seemed to have got a new lease of life. You 
have no doubt known very good and valuable people, in whose 
absence less perfect forms of humanity breathed more freely. 
This was the case with Mrs. Barclay. She had known Bar- 
bara’s reign to he wise and good, hut she had fretted under it. 

Graham went away to his farm. He had only entered it 
the previous month. It was a sheep-walk on the Border ; 
and having been made up of several smaller farms thrown 
together, there was no house on it suited to the ideas of a 
modern tenant-farmer, but Graham took possession of three 
rooms and a kitchen with infinite contentment. According to 
the terms of his lease, he was to get a new house, the site for 


BLINDPITS. 


489 


which he could choose, and the building would go on under 
his own eye. The cage would be ready by the time he had 
secured the singing-bird he meant to inhabit it. Before he 
left Blindpits, he had much given his mind to decide on the 
question, “ Should he venture to ask Bessie to write to him ? ” 
A letter from her would he priceless anywhere ; hut away 
where his chief company was the ovine and bovine people on 
the hills, and his music the singing burns, what would it not 
be to him ? Within himself he debated the matter anxiously. 
It was the consciousness that he regarded this as the first step 
towards the end he had in view, that made him hesitate. 
Dwelling on this aspect of it, it did not occur to him that she 
would think it a very natural and trivial thing. 

It was the day after the wedding. He had parted with the 
ladies at Blindpits, and gone over early in the forenoon to hid 
Mrs. Grant good-bye. He had done so on the previous night, 
hut it could he done over again without harm. He found her 
walking among the trees in the garden. She turned and saw 
him behind her. 

“ You didn’t expect to see me ? ” he said. 

“ Ho ; hut I was thinking of you — wondering whether you 
would be away yet, and I am very glad to see you.” 

u Are you ? ” 

“ Yes ; do you not believe me ? ” 

“ I wasn’t thinking what I was saying.” 

“ I have felt happy this morning ; this gorgeous weather, 
this beauty round us, makes me that I can’t help feeling so. 
I remember Mr. Grant once said to me that it could never he 
a sin to he happy. I wonder if he would think it a kind of 
treason to him if he knew I could he happy in a way without 
him.” 

11 Ho,” said Graham ; “ he loved you, and he must wish you 
happy.” 

“ Come and sit here,” she said, leading the way to the seat 
in the clipped yew. “ You would think the birds had gone 
crazy this morning ; they are making such a musical uproar 
There in the opposite field, look ! do you see a skylark just 
19 * 


490 


BLINDriTS. 


springing from the grass ? You would think that flying or 
singing would he enough at a time for a creature of that size. 
Does it feel, do you think — can it feel such a pitch of ecstacy ? 
I was seventeen years in this world before I heard the lark ; 
and how many people in yon great smoky Ironburgh miss 
that birthright altogether ! ” 

“ Did Mrs. Goldie or Miss Dobbie pine for a lark when they 
lived in Ironburgh ? ” asked Graham gravely. 

“ I know you are laughing at me, as you used to do, and it 
does me good; it is a real luxury, hut you don’t know the 
comfort I get from these birds and flowers. Oh, what a win- 
ter I have had — what a long winter of deep unmitigated 
gloom ! Looking hack on all that has happened these few 
years, it seemed as if we were only footballs for a malicious 
fate ; hut when summer hurst on us suddenly, and I came out 
here, it was like a resurrection ; I thought surely all will come 
right in the end, when even the sparrows are cared for. This 
morning I happened to look into a bird’s nest; it was empty. 
You remember Vaughn’s lines — ( The birds are singing some- 
where — somewhere,’ ” she slowly repeated, and her eyes filled 
with tears. 

Could Graham he jealous of her love for the dead ? If he 
ever had loved her, he loved her more intensely now. If he 
had dared he would have poured his heart out at her feet ; 
hut he was awed and purified from selfishness at that moment. 
More than that, if she had given him any opening, if there 
had been anything in her manner less simple and natural 
than it was, although he would undoubtedly have caught at 
it, she would have suffered in his estimation in spite of him- 
self, at least he felt a lover’s exaltation in thinking that all 
she said was “ wisest, virtuousest, discreetest, best.” He 
could have sat in this fair scene and listened to the murmur 
of her sweet voice till doomsday, 

“ I’ll bestir myself,” she went on. “ Queeny of course will 
he my first object in life ; hut there are many things a person 
with leisure and a little money can do — many, things — and I’ll 
learn to forget myself and think of others. I’ve got renewed 


BLINDPITS. 


491 


strength, and although we can’t forget, we can hear our burden 
wisely. I’m talking on as if you cared to hear me ; hut I 
have faith that you do care, and you used to understand so 
quickly, that is such a comfort. Aunt is wise and good, hut 
she has never loved and lost; she couldn’t imagine it — she 
couldn’t imagine it, and I was selfish and unreasonable.” 

“ I think I understand, Bessie,” he said ; “ hut if I can’t 
exactly feel with you, it would take long to tell how much I 
have felt for you.” 

“ I’m sure of it, Graham ; I’m sure of it.” 

If ever the inexorable impertinence of railway trains is to 
be felt, it is at such a moment as this. Graham knew if he 
missed the train at Heatherburgh that afternoon, he could not 
get a train at Eastburgh to take him home till next day, and 
he had made several business appointments, to be kept on his 
journey ; but what of that ? he let the hour pass, and after 
all he couldn’t stay there very long. 

Bessie discovered he was too late for the train he had spoken 
of going by. 

“ Are you vexed ? ” she said anxiously. “ I suppose you 
did not think it polite to interrupt me. You were not on 
such ceremony on Berwick Street. What will you do ? was 
it important that you should have gone at twelve ? ” 

“ Very important.” 

“ How provoking ! but it’s your own blame.” 

“ I’m lazy ; I would like to sit here all day.” 

“ Then sit all day. I’ll go in and see what they are doing 
about dinner, and ” 

“.Ho, don’t go,” and he laid his hand on her arm ; “I must 
positively move off in a quarter of an hour.” 

“ You prefer sitting here to going in doors ? ” 

“Yes.” 

“ Very well ; I’ll get lunch brought here.” 

“Ho, don’t — don’t speak of eating — I couldn’t eat. I’m 
not” 

“Hungry? but I am. I haven’t been holding forth for 
two hours without getting hungry. I suppose you have gqt 
over your boyish taste for biscuits and jam ? ” 


492 


BLINDPITS. 


“ Ob, well, yes ; I could eat that, but nothing less ambro- 
sial.” He watched her disappear into the house and come 
back with a plate of biscuits in one hand and a pot of jam in 
the other, which she set on the seat between them. 

“ I wonder,” she said, "if Eve invented jam ? ” 

“ I’m sure she did if Adam first invented sugar.” 

“ That’s not likely,” she said. “ He doesn’t seem to have 
been what Americans call a smart man.” 

“ It’s a difficult thing to imagine one’s-self in Adam’s 
shoes.” 

“He wouldn’t have any shoes, you know, but he could 
hardly have a simpler meal than this.” 

“ Nor better ; I wonder how you remembered I liked bis- 
cuits and jam.” 

“ I have a good memory, but it wasn’t a great feat to remem- 
ber that. I used to be astonished at the quantity you ate.” 

“ Keally ! then I had better stop now. Would you mind — 
I was thinking perhaps you wouldn’t mind taking the trouble 
of writing to me sometimes. At my out-of-the-way place a 
letter is a treasure.” 

“ Trouble ! ” she cried frankly ; “ it would be no trouble ; 
it would be a pleasure ; but what could I write that you would 
care 'to read ? I shall be here all alone. Would it interest 
you to hear that Queeny had cut another tooth, how far she 
could walk, what words she could say ? ” 

“ Yes, it would interest me very much ; but you can tell me 
of the Heatherburgh people, your grandmamma, and Mrs. 
Goldie.” 

“ But Mrs. Goldie writes to you herself.” 

“ She used to do so ; she may not now.” 

“ Ah, she’ll do it. You are a great favorite ; but if you 
were not, she would think it a duty and write duly.” 

“ But h^r letters are— -do you not think — her letters are a 
little dry ? ” 

“ If hers are dry, what will mine be ? but I’ll write, and 
risk your criticism. Dq you mean to answer them ? ” 

“You’ll see.” 


BLINDPITS. 


493 


Thus the vital question was set at rest ; and was Graham 
pleased? He ought to have been; hut — if she had only 
promised to write just a shade less as a matter of course 

On the way to the station he met Dr. Grant. 

“You are here yet?” he cried. “I thought you were to 
have vanished in the forenoon.” 

“ So I was ; hut I changed my mind.” 

“Under what temptation? — a delightful tete-a-tete or a 
walk with Miss Dobbie ? ” 

. “ I might have been worse employed.” 

“ Calling at Grantsburn, for instance — visiting widows is a 
good employment.” 

“ J ohn, you are incorrigible.” 

“ How is my step-sister ? ” 

“ I didn’t see her. She was sleeping, I suppose.” 

“ Are you not going to see Mary ? ” 

“ I saw her yesterday ; she doesn’t expect me.” 

“But you saw Mrs. Grant yesterday too. Mary will he 
jealous and offended. You are going back to your hut ? 
Who would have thought of your turning out a romantic 
hermit ? ” 

“ Who indeed ? ” said Graham, laughing good-naturedly. 


CHAPTER LXVIII. 


Graham went back to his hut, sat at the window of his 
little room, looking down the grassy valley that showed the 
glittering folds of the burn like jewels on the breast of a fair 
woman. The evening sun was touching all the tops of the 
hills with glory, as a dying artist gives the last strokes to his 
picture from an imagination kindled by nearness to the heaven- 
ly world. The flocks and herds looked in good health and con- 
dition ; and matter-of-fact as that view of them is, they could 
not have been pleasant objects in the landscape if they had 
not, especially to the owner gazing at them. He had been 
tramping over his grounds the whole day, and having come in 
wearied, had throw r n himself down with a book, but he had 
read none. Three days ago he had been wflth Bessie at 
Blindpits ; two days ago he had been with her at Grantsburn, 
and he went over every look and word of hers during these 
times, not to gather encouragement from them — for as far as 
that went they were a blank — but to feed himself. When 
might he dare to speak of the wish that so possessed him ? 
She would write. He must be guided by the tone of her 
letters. Surely she must throw some glance into the future. 
She could not mean to live alone for life. She could not have 
forgotten the past, as connected with him ; and she had said 
it would be a pleasure to write to him. Like Rumpilstiltskin 
in the fairy story, he spun this straw into a strong golden 
hope — almost certainty. She would write — when would she 
write ? In two weeks ? or two months ? or when ? What a 
fool he was not to have asked when he might expect a letter ! 


BLIXDPITS. 


495 


Then he thought he would write first, and that would bring a 
letter more speedily. He meditated as to what he would say 
and watched two figures coming up the burn — the children of 
one of his servants who went to school every day to the 
nearest village. Very slowly they came on, stopping to play 
when the spirit moved them ; like the spider, they lived along 
the line. At length they passed round the end of the house ; 
and shortly after his servant entered the room, and laid down 
several letters, saying — 

“ Tommy brought them ; the afternoon post was in afore 
they left the village.” 

Lazily he took them up. A sudden glow overspread his 
face ; there was his name in Bessie’s writing — the hold care- 
less writing her aunt had bewailed so often — a good hand if 
she could only take pains, and pay attention, and think what 
she was about. He opened it, his fingers almost trembling. 
Was it a delicious confirmation of his hopes — or would it dash 
them ? He read — 

“ Dear Graham — It was so like you to ask me to write 
you, and draw me a little out of my sad thoughts, for I am 
sure a letter such as mine can he no object to you. But first, 
like a true-born Briton, let me unburden myself about the. 
weather. Yesterday, earth, sea, and sky, were perfect; to- 
day all is changed : we have east wind, and a thick wall of 
wet mist — that makes man and beast, and even the trees, 
cower — surrounds us. It is too bad to write to you in an east 
wind. You’ll be on your way home. I hope you’ll not get 
cold. 11th . — I w r as interrupted yesterday. This is what 
Mrs. Dods called the lang ’leventh o’ June, do you remember? 
Aunt and Mr. Goldie drove over this forenoon. They are 
certainly different. Whether they are the complements of 
each other I don’t know ; I hope so — they seem very happy. 
He does not make a secret of it; and even aunt, who you 
know is not throw r n off her equilibrium by everything, was 
brighter than I have seen her since Miss Boston’s death. 
Human happiness is to me a more touching sight than human 


496 


BLINDP1TS. 


misery, if possible. I almost fear to look on it, in case the 
spell should break. But one can’t be sentimental in Mr. 
Goldie’s presence. Aunt always repressed the puling ten- 
dency in me, not with much success, I fear, for I am ashamed 
to say, after they left I sat down and cried heartily ; that was 
weak, and it is weaker still to tell of it. My beloved aunt ! I 
hope she does not feel her husband’s grammatical slips ; only, 
if she were not on the watch to prevent herself, I am sure she 
would correct them from force of habit. You wanted hints 
from me about your new house. Mr. Goldie could give you 
valuable advice from his recent experience. When they left 
me they went across to grandmamma’s. Queeny is growing 
fretful, and wishes me to take her on my knee. — With best 
wishes, I am yours sincere^, 

“ Bessie Grant.” 

Lover though he was, Graham felt at once that neither 
Bessie’s thoughts nor her heart were in these lines, but only 
her good nature. She had wished to do a kind thing, and she 
had done it. His spirits fell — he seemed as far from his goal 
as ever. But the letter had come from her, had been touched 
by her, and he sat with it in his hand, watching the fading 
day, and, in the hush of the June twilight, listening to the 
quiet song the burn sang to the sleeping hills. Woods there 
w-ere none except half-a-dozen old trees that stood at the head 
of the glen, and which he meant to press into the service of 
his new house, to as much advantage as possible. They, he, 
and the hills, paid the song the compliment of rapt, silent at- 
tention, and it soothed him as the murmur of a mother’s voice 
soothes a restless child. 

With more or less frequency letters went to and fro for 
many months. Sometimes they showed gleams of Bessie’s 
old spunk, and Graham thought, “ Now she is going to throw 
aside the past, and will be herself again ; ” then there ^vas a 
relapse, and so on. He did not go to Grantsburn ; he knew 
he could not do that again without betraying himself. At 
the beginning of winter Bessie wrote that she had made up 


BLINDPITS. 


497 


her mind to leave Grantsburn. “ It has cost me much,” she 
said, “ to come to that resolution ; but it is best. I might 
stay, for I am assured that the Marquis would never ask me 
to leave ; but my husband’s successor is about to be married ; 
and the house, no doubt is attached to the office, and is his 
right. Susan Ainslie is to be his wife, and she does not want 
to have a house in Heatherburgh, and said to me, 1 she was 
surprised how I cared to live in a big house like this all 
alone.’ She is not over-sensitive; but who can touch my 
wound so gently that I shall not wince ? If one could only 
shut the lid on memory ! So I shall go to Blindpits for the 
winter at least. I may be of some use there, and Queeny will 
amuse grandmamma.” 

Graham was pleased to hear of this arrangement, although 
he knew the two old ladies sufficiently to be aware that 
between them Bessie would be worried often enough ; but it 
was better for her that she should be worried than that she 
should be let alone. 

He speculated much on her letters that winter, and, as is 
usual with commentators, he saw a great deal in them that 
was not there. He fancied the tone of them weary; and 
when she said in one, “ I generally play backgammon with 
grandmamma at night ; but she finds me a poor antagonist, 
and wishes often she had you. I thought farmers had noth- 
ing to do in winter. Why don’t you bestow some of your 
spare time on us ? ” — he analysed that sentence, not 
grammatically you know. He sifted it, he tried what con- 
struction it would bear ; he even attempted to persuade him- 
self that it was an innocent hint, the wish being father to the 
thought — to use again words that have been much tramped in 
the mire of quotation. 

He made some sort of general excuse for not having been at 
Blindpits ; and then came another letter repeating the former 
invitation, with the addition, “ Grandmamma thinks you put 
us off in a very lame way. I can only suppose you are grow- 
ing lazy ; a bucolic life has a dozey effect on the energies. 
Do you never leave home except to go to a market, and is 


498 


BLINDPITS. 


your talk chiefly of bullocks ? If so, I would advise you tc 
seek the haunts of civilisation as soon as may he ; there must 
surely he a singular fascination in a hut and a hen.” 

And Graham believed, and went to Blindpits to look into 
the hook of fate. He went without having given notice of 
his coming. Asking for Mrs. Grant, he was shown into the 
room where she was sitting by the fire reading the newspapers. 
She started up with a glow of pleasure on her face — 

“ Graham ! ” she exclaimed. 11 You have come at last ! I 
must let grandmamma know ; it is too good news to keep her 
ignorant of ; ” and she rang the hell and said to the servant, 
“ Tell Mrs. Barclay that Mr. Richardson is here.” 

“ There is no need to hurry Mrs. Barclay,” said Graham, 
with a shade of annoyance. 

“ Oh, she won’t hurry ; hut it will please her to hear you 
have come.” 

u I thought you wanted me,- Bessie,” he said. 

“ So I did. I like to see you. You didn’t think I wanted 
you for anything particular? I’m sure if you had you 
would have come sooner ; ” and a smile sweeter than the smile 
of her merriest maiden days shed its witchery right into Gra- 
ham’s heart. 

“ I was afraid to come any sooner,” he said, venturing a 
step. 

“ Afraid ! ” she said ; “ what were you afraid of? ” 

“I was afraid of the reception I might get.” 

“ Graham ! ” she said, in a tone of reproachful surprise. 

“ You know it then, Bessie ? ” he said eagerly. “ You 
know that your letters are all I have had to live on ? ” 

“ Meagre diet ! ” she interrupted. 

“ All I have had to live on ; and you must have seen from 
mine — you surely must have seen from the strain of mine — 
that I was coming some day — some day — to ask you to — to be 
my wife ? ” 

She was sitting at the table, with her hand resting on it, 
looking up at him ; he was standing beside her; now she bent 
her head and murmured — 


BLINDPITS. 


499 


“ I did not know it — I did not know it. 0 Graham ! I 
cannot forget. If I could have dreamed that you would mis- 
interpret my readiness to write to you, my wish to have you 
for a friend, I would not — I wouldn’t ” and her voice trem- 
bled, and she stopped. 

“ I have come too soon,” he said. 

“ Ho ! ” she said firmly, and looking up at him ; “ I cannot 
forget, and I would not if I could.” 

“ I only ask you to think of the living.” 

“ It cannot he — not in that way. I shall never marry.” 

“ Bessie, I went from you once before ; you, who have loved 
and lost, must know what I suffered then. Must I go again, 
and dare I never come back ? ” 

“ Don’t come back, please don’t come back,” she said almost 
childishly ; “ time will make no difference. 0 Graham ! I am 
sony.” 

“ Don’t be sorry for me,” he said ; “ I shall not love you 
alwa 3 r s without return ; I am not abject. My love may have 
lived on meagre diet, which I was fool enough to fancy rich 
food ; it will die of indifference ; I can bear it.” He was very 
white, and spoke hastily in a kind of choked voice. 

“ 1 cannot help it ! ” she almost sobbed. 

“ I don’t mean to distress you. Say that I may come back 
in time ; I can wait — years if you will — I don’t want you to 
marry me now, nor ever unless you love me as I love you ; 
give me a hope of that — only give me a hope of that.” 

“ Graham,” she said sadly, “ I cannot ; it seems — it is to me 
an impossibility.” 

“ Then it is over indeed. What a delusion I have 
nursed ! ” he muttered. 

There seemed nothing for him but to go, and he moved 
towards the door. 

“ Graham,” she said with hesitation, and holding out her 
hand, “ would you care to hear of us ? I could still write, if 
you would not ” 

“Ho; not now,” he said. “If I can’t have all, I must 
have nothing.” 


500 


BLINDPITS. 


“ Will you not stop and see grandmamma ? ” 

He stood a moment at the open door. “ Perhaps 1 had 
better — yes, Pll stay. If I don’t she’ll worry you about it 
after.” He came back, took the newspaper, and buried him- 
self behind it. He was in a maze — the hope of his life had 
vanished. 

He heard a slight rustle ; and when he looked up Bessie 
was gone, and, what was an intolerable annoyance, in a few 
minutes Miss Bobbie appeared. 

Miss Bobbie appeared to apologise for Mrs. Barclay. Mrs. 
Barclay was having her afternoon nap, and she thought it 
a pity to disturb her. She would not likely sleep long now, 
etc. etc. 

“ And how do you think dear Mrs. Grant is looking, Mr. 
Richardson ? Hot very well, I doubt. Queeny has had 
hooping-cough, and her mamma has made herself quite a slave, 
seldom or never leaving her. She is one of the most devoted 
of mothers.” 

“ Is Queeny very ill ? ” Graham said shortly. He remem- 
bered with remorse that he had not even asked for her. 

“ Oh no ; she has never been very ill, and she is nearly 
better, but is still kept in one room. I sometimes persuade 
her mamma to leave her in my charge. She is very unwil- 
ling, but I insist on it. It is such a beautiful thing a mother’s 
love ! I can quite sympathise with our dear Bessie. To 
think of her a widow! What a sweet young interesting 
widow she is, Mr. Richardson ! A widow must be wrapped 
up in her child — her only child. How Mrs. Barclay can’t 
see that. She often tells Bessie that she is making an idol of 
Queeny, and that she’ll read her sin in her punishment some 
day.” 

“We’ll hope not, Miss Bobbie.” 

A naturalist needs only to see one bone of an animal to 
enable him to construct the entire skeleton ; so, from this acci- 
dental glimpse, Graham saw, and comprehended at once, that 
the kernel of the old Berwick Street life was here, though en- 
closed in a much handsomer shell. 


BLINDPITS. 


601 


If Graham had a virtue, it was humility, and that is a 
heaven-horn grace ; hut, humble as he was, he knew the love 
he offered Bessie was a thing worth taking — a thing worth 
her taking ; and he pitied her — he pitied her and himself. 
He had not the wild tumult that had lashed him into brain- 
fever before — an identical experience never occurs ; hut it 
seemed as if his life had come to a stand. He sat quietly 
and talked to Miss Dobbie, or rather heard her talk, and 
played backgammon all the evening with Mrs. Barclay ; and 
then, against the combined entreaty of those ladies he took 
his departure. 


CHAPTER LXIX. 


It was a long time before he saw Bessie again. He made 
no effort to see her ; and when he did meet her it was unex- 
pectedly. He was in Eastburgh, and as usual went to Miss 
Grant’s. He was always as welcome in her house as daylight. 
There he found Bessie and her child. Queeny was ailing, 
had been ailing for some time, and her mother was naturally 
pre-occupied about her. She met Graham with customary 
frankness, and no shade of constraint, and his pride served 
him well ; for a day or two he acted the ordinary acquaintance 
with much success. How and then he allowed himself to 
gaze on her face unnoticed ; and once, when she left the room, 
he sighed deeply ; so that Miss Grant said, cheerily — 

“ What’s the matter, Graham ? There is no mortality 
among your sheep, is there ?” 

“ Ho. What made you ask that ? ” 

“ The way you were sighing. I thought you were oppressed 
with care.” 

“Was I sighing ? It was unconscious then.” 

One morning he was in Miss Grant’s sitting-room with 
Bessie and her daughter only. He had been trying to amuse 
the child, for he was sure she was recovering, and would soon 
be as well as ever; but failing in that, he had taken the news- 
paper. He did not read though ; he was watching the anx- 
ious care Bessie was lavishing on her child, and the looks of 
deep love she shed upon her. He watched till an evil spirit 
took possession of him, and he suddenly said, “ If she dies ! ” 


BLINDPITS. 


503 


and laughed, not loud; hut he laughed. Bessie looked up 
and her great dark eyes flashed. The color rushed to his face ; 
and he rose and left the room without speaking. He went 
out into the street. “ What a brute I have been !” he mut- 
tered, u to he jealous of a mother’s love for her child. If I 
had the shadow of a chance it is gone now — gone ! ” 

He could not go hack to the house. He wrote to Miss 
Grant, saying he had to go home sooner than he intended^ 
and would not he able to see her before he left. To Bessie he 
wrote — 

“ Dear Mrs. Grant — I cannot explain the brutality of 
the speech I made to-day ; I can only apologize for it. I do 
most humbly apologize for it. — I am, yours truly, 

G. Richardson.” 

Bessie put down the note. “ Poor Graham ! ” she said. 
Her anger had been only a momentary flash. She thought 
of him the whole day. Why had he said such a cruel thing ? 
His laugh rang in her ear — a bitter laugh — although different 
from his usual laugh. The whole thing was so unlike him 
that she was driven up to the right theory of it. 

“ 0 Queeny,” she thought, “I was so absorbed in you that I 
did not show him the least attention — not the least — after all 
his long unwearied kindness.” 

She would have written to him, but she remembered he had 
declined her letters. 

Graham thought he had finished his cause by that speech. 
In point of fact, it had laid his first secure footing in her 
heart. 

His grief and remorse were deepened, if possible, when, 
some months after news came to him of Queeny’s death. 
She died ; she had only been four years in the world, and her 
death was a very unimportant thing to the world. Mrs. 
Ainslie said, “ It would leave her mother wholly unshackled.” 
It certainly did that. 

What an awful pause there w T as in Bessie’s life now ! The 


504 


BLINDPITS. 


little girl had wound her tendrils round the hearts of the Gol- 
dies, and grandmamma, and Miss Dobbie ; and Bessie had the 
true and united sympathy she had missed so bitterly in her 
first terrible bereavement. Mrs. Goldie did not attempt con- 
solation, or exhort to resignation as she had done before ; she 
only wept with her, which was far better. Graham’s heart 
bled for her, hut he did not dare to write — the memory of that 
speech, which must have burned itself into her, prevented 
him. And Bessie wondered — many times wondered — why he 
said never a word. 

u He loved Queeny ; I’m sure he did,” she would say to 
Miss Dobbie. “ He never saw much of her, hut she did not 
forget him. She sometimes asked me ‘when Game would 
come again,’ ” and the poor mother’s voice faltered. 

11 Ah ! Mr. Bichardson is a favorite with young and old,” 
said Miss Dobbie ; “ but he has given us up now, perhaps he 
has found a closer attraction nearer home.” 

Time crept on, and the house grew accustomed to the still- 
ness, but Bessie could not forget the clasp of the loving little 
arms. It was well with the child, that she knew ; hut, oh, the 
desolation to her ! 

“You know, Bessie, my dear,” said Miss Dobbie, “I think 
you should go a little more into society than you do ; it is not 
natural for a young person to live so very quietly as you do ; 
or if you would take a change. Mrs. Goldie proposed you 
going to her for a little ” 

“ Yes, I’l^ go,” said Bessie. a Aunt will make me do some- 
thing ; I shall he ashamed to he idle beside her ; hut I’ll tell 
you what, Miss Dobbie, I’m going to Ironburgh first.” 

“A very good plan, if you don’t think old associations will 
he too much for you. I think you should go somewhere 
you’ve never been before, among people you’ve never seen 

before, and try to eat ” u Something I’ve never eaten 

before,” continued Bessie. “ I am going to see Mr. Dods. I 
am ashamed I have never seen him since we left Ironburgh, 
and if he is able I’ll bring him back here with me.” 

“ If your grandmamma approves.” 


BLINDPITS. 


505 


“ She approves. I spoke to her this morning.” 

Bessie went to Middleburgh that afternoon, stayed all night 
with the Goldies, and went to Ironburgli next day. Arrived 
at the station there, she drove direct to Berwick Street. 

Graham Bichardson was in Ironburgh on this day, and he 
too called at Berwick Street. This time the buxom niece 
welcomed him heartily, and opened on him in volume. “ 0 
sir,” she said, u ye’re just come in gude time ; my uncle’s 
been wearying to see ye ; he’s ta’en to his bed now for the best 
part o’ a fortnight, and I doubt if he’ll ever come out o’t.” 

“ Indeed,” said Graham ; “ he doesn’t suffer much, does 
he ?” 

u Bo, I think no ; he never compleens ; it’s just weakness 
like. He’s never been the same man since my auntie’s death ; 
and what vexes me, Mr. Bichardson, is, though he’s sae ill, 
and Mr. Pettigrew is as anxious as can be to see him now and 
then to gie him a word in season — as wha’s better qualified ? 
— he just gangs daft if I sae muckle as hints at it. It’s vexa- 
tious. Just this morning I said to him, 1 Uncle, I fancy if 
ye was to keek in at the door o’ heaven an’ see Pettigrew 
there, ye wadna be for gaun in ? ’ and what do you think he 
said ? he said, 1 it wad be matter for consideration ; ’ heard ye 
ever the like o’ that ? ” 

“ If Mr. Dods doesn’t -want to see him, there’s no use teas- 
ing him about it,” said Graham, a little sharply. 

" Teasing him, Mr. Bichardson ! it’s a’ for his gude.” 

“ It will do him no good, better let him alone ; ■ will you ask 
if he will see me ? I have no wish to thrust myself on him 
if he doesn’t wish it.” 

“I daresay neither has Mr. Pettigrew — what interest o’ his 
is it ? ” she asked, betraying the strain in her nature that 
fitted her to enjoy the lodger’s company. 

“ Uncle,” said the girl, “ here’s a friend you’ll be glad to 
see.” 

The face was thinner and grayer than ever, and the head 
was at rest on the pillow, the long neck relieved from its bur- 
den. He seemed comfortable enough, but had not the energy 
22 


506 


BLINDPIT3. 


to move till he heard who his visitor was, then he turned 
round and held out his hand. Graham sat down heside him. 
“ I’m glad to see ye, man” he said. 

“But I’m sorry to see you — in bed I mean.” 

The old man’s face worked as if suppressing some emotion. 
His niece went away, asking Graham to ring if they wanted 
anything. 

“ Ah, hut you must get up again,” said Graham, cheerily, 
and get out for a walk. I see they are making great improve- 
ments near you ; you must go out and look after them.” 

“Weel, I’m glad to hear it. I took a look at the papers 
this morning, and I was glad to see it for the sake o’ other 
folk. I’ll walk no more.” 

In his heart Graham felt that it was so, and he kept 
silence. 

“ It’s a queer thing — a queer thing,” said Mr. Dods, 
musingly, “ that I am to he persecuted wi’ that man Petti- 
grew to the last. I’ve been thinking a’ morning o’ what that 
lassie said ; she said, 1 What would I do if I saw Pettigrew in 
heaven?’ Weel, I’m a great sinner — a great sinner; hut if 
I do meet him there, he’ll be different, and I’ll he different, 
and maybe we’ll can compluther, although it’s no easy seeing 
how it can he. But there’s ae thing : Peter’ll aye he for 
pushing hen, and I’ll be mair than content just to he within 
the door, so we’ll maybe no meet often. Ye mind what John 
Bunyan said when he saw the glory through the door as it 
opened and shut — 1 1 wished I were among them ; ’ if I just 
were inside the door — inside the door.” 

“ For Christ’s sake,” said Graham, softly. 

“ Ay, for Christ’s sake — for Christ’s sake,” said the old man, 
fervently. “ Oh, for what itlier sake could we hope to he 
there ? ” 

There was silence again ; Mr. Dods was the first to break 
it. 

“ I may no see you again, Mr. Bichardson, and I may tell 
ye that I’ve left my books to Bessie — that’s Mrs. Grant — she 
kens maist o’ them already, and she’ll tak’ care o’ them, I’m 


BLINDPITS. 


507 


sure ; and I’ve left my manuscripts to you. If ye should ever 
think o’ publishing them, ye’ll find them a’ in correct order, 
wi’ a preface, which I think will do wi’ little if ony alteration. 
Some poets has been little thocht o’ till they were dead; 
whether that’ll he my case or no, I dinna ken, or if it is, 
whether I’ll be aware o’t ; onyway, there’s naething in them I 
would be ashamed o’ sittin’ inside the door, if I’m there. Oh, 
to he there ! ” he* said with energy, as if losing sight of his 
strongest earthly interests ; “ I pray to he there, for Christ’s 
sake.” 

Once more there was silence for a time. Then he groped 
below his pillow, and took out some small thing wrapped in 
paper.' 

“ This,” he said, “ is a hit brooch she used to wear ; it’s o’ 
nae value — nae value whatever, hut ye’ll tak’ it and gie’t to 
Miss Barclay, that’s Mrs. Goldie, in memory o’ her” 

It was at this moment that the door opened, and to Gra- 
ham’s astonishment, Bessie entered. He rose quickly, and 
she blushed very deeply when she saw him ; he observed this, 
and felt at once that it was caused by the remembrance of 
that last time he had spokefi. to her. Having shaken hands 
with him, for the first time in her life with a species of con- 
straint, which he was aware of, and also construed as marking 
her deep feeling of displeasure, she took the thin veined hand 
of Mr. Dods, and the old man looked in her face. “ Bessie,” 
he said, “ this is kind.” 

“ Don’t say that, it seems a reproach ; I ought to have been 
here long ago.” 

“Puir thing, puir thing!” he said, stroking her hand; 
“ ye’ve had muckle o’ your ain to hear.” There was a pause ; 
then she said, “ I came from Middleburgh this morning, 
where aunt lives — Mrs. Goldie you know — she asked me to 
remember her most kindly to you. She and I thought you 
might return with me and pay us a visit.” 

“ If I had been able — but I’ll travel nae mair except the 
last journey.” Then he wandered into old times, and spoke 
of his wife, and told Bessie of the trinket Mr. Richardson had 


508 


BLINDPITS. 


to give to Mrs. Goldie, and that he had left her — Mrs. Grant 
— his hooks. 

“ Don’t speak of that,” she said, with the tears in her eyes ; 
“ much as I would value them, I hope you’ll live to use them 
a long time yet.” 

“ And I have left my poems to Mr. Richardson here,” he 
went on saying to her. “ You’ll help him to look them over 
if they’re ever printed; you and him’ll meet a gey wheen 
auld friends among them.” Then to change the subject, he 
said, “Ye’ll mind Pettigrew, Bessie?” 

She smiled. “ Perfectly, Mr. Dods.” 

“ Weel, Mr. Richardson,” and he looked at Graham, “he 
was aye a great hand for collecting the news, and I under- 
stand he’s heard that you are gaun to he married.” 

“ Indeed ! ” said Graham. 

“ Yes ; and it’s the best thing ye can do, if ye get a gudo 
wife, and I think ye’re fit to wale a gude ane ; and I wish 
you muckle joy.” 

“ Thank you,” said Graham. 

“ You are fatiguing yourself, Mr. Dods,” said Bessie. “ I 
think I must go now ; and I hope not to he long of being 
hack.” 

“Fare ye weel then,” said the old man. 

She held out her hand to Graham. “ I’ll go with you to 
the foot of the stair,” he said. Then, turning to Mr. Dods, 
“ Take a rest now. I’ll be up in the evening again.” 

She went down stairs before him. “There are ghosts in 
this stair,” she said. “I met one coming up — a shabbily- 
dressed child with white face and staring eyes ; you were 
kind to her long ago.” 

“ I met that ghost too,” he said. 

He handed her into the carriage, “ Good-bye, Graham. I 
need not say that I wish you every happiness.” 

She said it in such a composed tone, that for the first time 
in his life he was set on edge by her. 

“ Thank you,” he said drily. “ Where shall I tell the man 
to drive ? ” 


BLINDriTS. 


509 


“ To the station. I’m just going Lack to Middleburgh.” 

“ You’ll have some time to wait.” 

“ It doesn’t matter. I can wait at the station.” 

He shut the door, lifted his hat, and saw her drive off. 

“She wishes me every happiness,” he muttered bitterly. 
“Well, women can do and say things that I could not.” 
Then his face darkened as he recalled his horrible speech to 
her when her child was ill. “ But I,” he thought, “ was mad 
— mad at the moment — and she has all her senses.” 

Bessie had only driven away w T hen she dropped her face 
into her hands and sobbed. “ He w r ould not always love me, 
he said, and it is over now,” she murmured, and all the past 
came back on her — her long and intimate knowledge of him, 
his goodness, his loneliness ; and she wondered if she were 
utterly selfish, that she had only w*aked into love and sym- 
pathy for him when she herself was left alone, and that now 
she should grudge him his happiness. She despised herself. 
“ I am not worthy of him,” she said, “ or I would have felt all 
this sooner.” 

When she reached Middleburgh Villa, her aunt said, 
“ Bessie, your journey has done you more ill than good. You 
shouldn’t have gone and come the same day.” 

“It’s not that, aunt — not the fatigue ; but it was touching 
to see Mr. Dods as he is now. He has given Graham his 
wife’s brooch to give you — you mind it. I declare there was 
such a raking-up of old feelings that I was glad to get out of 
the stair before I broke down. Graham happened to be there 
too, and Mr. Dods said he and I would arrange his poems 
together, if they were ever published. One way and another 
I w r as so harassed. Had one not better let old feelings lie 
dormant, do you not think, aunt ? ” 

“Yes, if recalling them unfits one for present duty; much 
better to let the dead bury their dead.” 

“If one could, aunt — if one only could! Yes, yes,” she 
said humbly ; “ I’ll do it, aunt ; I would like to do it.” She 
was turning over a basket of plain work on which Mrs. Goldie 
was in the habit of employing an hour or two of her day. 


510 


BLINDP1TS 


“I’m toned down to sewing now; it takes a good deal of dis- 
cipline to bring one to sewing.” 

Mr. Goldie laughed. “ Does it ? ” he said ; “ I thought wo- 
men took to sewing naturally ? ” 

“Not I,” said Bessie. 

“ Many a good woman has found much comfort in her nee- 
dle,” said Mrs. Goldie. 

“ Then I must take to it ; it’s my last resource,” thought 
Bessie. 

In the evening Graham found Mr. Dods much revived, for 
the time at least. In going out he met all the ghosts — the 
ghost of his own boyish happiness among them. Bessie was 
not alone in having her feelings harrowed that day. As he 
stopped a moment in the stair, he involuntarily raised his hat 
as he thought of all the care, and toil, and anguish that had 
been under that roof. “ How will it all look,” he thought, 
“after we have met inside the door? May we all meet 
there ! ” 

Next time he came to Berwick Street it was to attend the 
old man’s funeral, and then these little houses passed to other 
inhabitants, to grow other crops of thrilling human interests 
in the little rooms that are always so thickly peopled. 


CHAPTER LXX. 


Months after this Graham got a letter, addressed in a 
lady’s writing — very beautiful writing it was — that he did not 
know. He wondered who on earth could be writing to him, 
or what any unknown lady could he writing about. With 
some little curiosity he tore it open ; at a glance he saw it was 
dated Blindpits, and signed “Jane Dobbie.” Miss Dobbie 
wrote thus : — 

“ Dear Mr. Richardson — You will be surprised, no doubt, 
at getting a letter from me, although it is not so very surpris- 
ing either, considering how very long we have been ac- 
quainted. You will be glad to learn that we are all well. 
Mr. and Mrs. Goldie were here yesterday; that has turned 
out an exceedingly happy marriage, and has gone far to re- 
move my prejudices against unequal marriages, for unquestion- . 
ably Miss Barclay was the superior of Mr. Goldie in point 
of birth and education. 

“ I have said we are all well ; let me correct myself, we are 
not all quite well. Our dear Bessie, I am sorry to say, is 
drooping ; not that she is ill exactly ; she won’t allow that. I 
think she requires change of society, and air, and scene — a 
thorough and complete change. I try to get her to go more 
into society here than she does, but she is very averse to it. 
How, I don’t know whether you are married yet or not, but if 
not, I believe that interesting event will take place very soon. 
How, my plan is that you and your young, and I do not doubt 
lovely wife should pay us a visit here ; it would rouse £nc( 


512 


BLINDPITS. 


amuse her ; or, failing that, could } 7 ou not invite her to he your 
guest for a time, which in some respects might he even better ? 
You will tell your wife Bessie’s very interesting history, and I 
am sure she will join us in doing our utmost for her ; it is 
very touching to see so young a creature drooping like a flower 
with a worm at its root. I trust I have made my meaning 
sufficiently clear ; and with very best wishes for you and your 
bride, I am, dear Mr. Bichardson, yours most sincerely, 

Jane Dobbie.” 

Graham mused over this letter, it vexed him, hut what 
could he do ? What he did immediately was to answer it. 
He wrote, — 


“Kingshope, Soutliburgh, 19th June 18 — . 
u Dear Miss Dobbie — I am much obliged by your letter. 
You have fallen into a mistake about me. I am neither mar- 
ried nor going to he, so that my wife can’t visit you, neither 
can she receive Mrs. Grant here. 

u The house I live in would hardly accommodate ladies ; I 
preferred staying in it, even after my new house was ready, 
and there is a tenant in the new house just now w T ho has a 
lease of it, two years of which are yet to run. But if Mrs. 
Grant wishes to visit here, I could look out accommodation 
for her in the neighborhood. I am very sorry indeed to hear 
that she is not in such good health as could be wished. 

20th June . — I went up to my tenant this morning to see 
what he would say about leaving the house. He doesn’t 
seem very willing, especially as the 12th of August is not 
very distant ; still it might be managed if Mrs. Grant preferred 
my house. In any case, I will do the best I can to serve her. 
— Waiting for farther instructions, I am, yours truly, 

“G. BlC HARDS ON.” 


The answer he got was this — 

“ Dear Graham — I must have written to you long ago if 
you had not told me not to do so. I have never forgotten 


BLINDPITS. 


513 


that, but I can’t help writing now. Miss Dobbie has shown 
me a letter of yours. I don’t know what nonsense she has 
been writing about me. I am quite well, and don’t want to 
visit your neighborhood. The idea of turning out your tenant 
is too absurd. Please think no more about it. 

" I ought to be sorry that you are not going to be married ; 
but if I were to say so, I would say what is not true ; I am 
very glad ; if you were happily married you would be lost to 
us, you know. This is very selfish I know. Grandmamma 
asks me to remember her to you, and with very kind regards, 
I am, yours truly, 

“Bessie Grant.” 


His answer was — 

“ Dear Bessie — I have been all day trying to interpret 
your letter. At one time it would have been enough for me 
to build a fair castle on, but I am wiser now ; I dare not build 
except on a secure foundation. Perhaps I am a fool once more 
in supposing there is anything in it. You know what I mean. 
Will you write again and ask me to come ? — I am, yours very 
truly, 

G. Bichardson.” 

As soon as a letter could come, it came. His hand trem- 
bled as he opened it. 

“Dear Graham — We are all very glad to know that you 
think of visiting us — especially grandmamma. Miss Dobbie 
desires me to give you her compliments. — I am, yours truly, 

Bessie Grant.” 

i 

The blood stole to his face, and a smile, eloquent of happi- 
ness, broke over it — his face became happiness w r ell. 

“Especially grandmamma,” he murmured, “that’s her, 
herself as she was before ” and he leaned his head on the 


514 


BLINDPITS. 


mantelpiece, and stood still for a long time. At last he moved, 
“Well, now that I have got her, where am I to put her?” he 
said to himself ; “ but that will he no difficulty to her, she’ll 
have much pleasure, of course, in waiting till two years are 
over.” 

He was at Blindpits next forenoon. The ladies had dis- 
persed to their morning occupations, and the room he was shown 
jnto was empty. When the servant took his card to Bessie, 
she started. “ So early,” she thought, “how has he managed 
it ? ” She ran down stairs, hut stopped a moment in the pas- 
sage ; he was standing on the hearth watching the door. She 
went in ; he met her. “ Bessie ! ” he said. She did not 
speak ; neither spoke for a time. It was enough. 

“ I expected to see your grandmamma come in. Why 
didn’t you send her to me ? ” 

“ It did not occur to me.” 

“ It’s a wonder it didn’t. How, then, wliat are we to do ? 
I can’t turn that man out of my house without making an 
enemy for life ” 

“ Don’t do that.” 

“ What shall we do then ? To he sure we can get a house 
anywhere, or we can go abroad for a time.” 

“ Ho, not abroad,” she said quickly. 

“ What do you wish ? Perhaps you would prefer to wait 
two years, and then go comfortably and rationally into our 
own house ? ” 

She looked at him. “ Would you prefer that ? ” 

“ Ho ; would you ? ” 

“0 no! ” she said ; “ no.” 

“ Why, I thought that would be exactly what you would 
propose. You are astonishingly reasonable.” 

“ Ah, you did not hang the terror of losing you over my 
head so long for nothing ! ” 

“ Bessie ! ” 

“ That day in Ironburgh, when Mr. Dods wished you hap- 
piness, and I did, you never put us right — it was cruel.” 


BLINDPITS. 


515 


“ You did it with such remarkable coolness, Bessie, that I 
was exasperated.” 

“ What it cost me to do it ! What it cost me ! ” 

“ I did not know. How could I know ? I thought it did 
not matter a straw to you whether it was true or not.” 

“ Graham ! ” 

Graham did not trust himself to speak for a little, then he 
went hack on the less moving theme. “But we haven’t 
settled what we’re to do.” 

“ I’ll tell you what I would like to do — go with you to the 
house you live in now.” 

“ I doubt that would hardly do.” 

“ Why not ? Ladies live in huts at the Antipodes, why 
not try it here ? I believe it’s a very good house.” 

“ Good what’s of it j but there’s only three rooms and a 
kitchen.” 

“ That would hold me, surely ? ” 

“ It might hold you, as you’re not very big ; but I don’t see 
how it would hold your clothes.” 

“ I haven’t many — you would be surprised how few I have ; 
and I could leave most of them here. I really don’t need 
them.” 

“ What would Mrs. Goldie say ? ” 

“ She must think we’re old enough now to do as we like.” 

“ What would people say ? ”- 

“ I don’t mind people.” 

“Neither do I.” 

“ I’ve pictured that place so often, I would like to be there 
with you.” 

“It will be a strange transformation. I’ll need the evi- 
dence of all my senses to believe it.” 

“You’ll let me come with you, then?” 

“ Yes ; I think on the whole I’ll permit you. You can try 
it. It’s a very retired situation for a young lady whose aim 
at one time was the boards and the footlights.” 

“ Don’t invent stories.” 


516 


BLINDPITS. 


{t I’m only recalling.” 

“ Witli a difference.” 

“ When shall we go ? ” 

“ Wlien you like.” 

“ That will he very soon.” 
And they went. 


THE END. 




















































































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